In the range of events I never thought would possibly happen, David Murray appearing on a podcast with Graeme Souness discussing EBTs is right up there! You would expect the master architect of the scheme that destroyed Rangers and a recipient of an EBT, paid when he was Blackburn Rovers manager, would keep well away from this subject. That they did not, tells you a great deal about the personalities of both.
Murray credited himself with giving Rangers nine-in-a-row and Gascoigne, and admitted to the sins of ambition and vanity. Ambition, that football fault which is so similar to being just perfect. Always be aware of characters throwing that around as their fault (I’m not going to mention our former vain and ‘ambitious’ character).
His technical defence was that auditors for Rangers and Murray International Holdings (MIH) both signed off on his EBT scheme. True, but wholly irrelevant. A quick explainer:
An EBT is a loan. Employers loan staff money every day. Crisis loans, relocations loans and loans to cover health-related issues are common. If it is a short-term matter, or in a small company, little or no paperwork is required. At other times, the loan needs to be formally written up. These loans can also be forgiven (often happens when a crisis loan is issued). No problem with this and no employment tax is due.
Rangers EBT scheme effectively paid footballers, managers and execs with these types of loans, however, for the footballers (at least), the loans were contractual obligations, with a clause which meant they never had to be repaid. In 2017, the UK Supreme Court ruled that these contracts were disguised renumeration and that employment taxes were due on them.
The contract invalidated the EBT structure. MIH possibly did not have the same contractual arrangements, so EY, their auditor, would be untroubled by the scheme. The point David Murray did not address, was whether Rangers auditor – Grant Thornton – were informed about the contractual nature of the club’s EBTs.
Grant Thornton are unlikely to defend themselves against this contagion, but no one pursued the firm for poor advice in relation to the signing of Rangers accounts. It is not credible to suggest that Grant Thornton knew of these contracts and no one has claimed they were told.
In adopting an ‘innovative tax strategy’, Rangers knew a challenge from HMRC was possible. They would have got away with it, were they not raided by City of London Police in relation to the Jean-Alain Boumsong sale to Newcastle (then managed by Souness). This transaction was subject to investigation by the Stevens Inquiry. That issue is worth an hour of your time reviewing the characters involved in the UK game at the time.
When this was going on, other things were crumbling around Murray. The Bank of Scotland went bust and was sold, with new oversight and a different appetite for his largesse. Rangers won three successive leagues in the run-up to administration, they were solvent and could have chosen to set money aside from Champions League qualification to offset a potential HMRC settlement. Instead, they returned to the roulette table year after year.
If I had my way, I would build a statue to David Murray outside Celtic Park. He has done more for our success than anyone not directly connected to Celtic. Without his navigation, Rangers would never have been liquidated, and Celtic would not have removed that “World’s most successful….” writing from the walls of what he vaingloriously called Murray Park. Celebrate the man, he is a gift to generations of Celtic fans.
Also, when he dies, I’m open to offers on writing a book.
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An Dún on 2nd October 2026 4:05 pm
JAMES1955 on 2ND OCTOBER 2026 3:39 PM
Who said that ?
—
No one, James. Best ignored, mate.
***********
I know. Usual lies and bull**** from the Burnley Board Bum Chum Clique.
Never bite the 🖐🏻 that feeds you.
🍑👅
🤷🏻♂️
in
Im in tae
I’m oot 🍸🍾🥃🍺
me anaw
naw, am in.
I often refer to this quote …….in a roundabout way it sort of refers to us….
I smoke four-cent cigars and I like them. If I were to smoke better ones, I might lose my taste for the cheap ones that I now find quite satisfactory.”
E.Robinson…
Edinburgh v The Stormers is a pretty ho-hum game of rugby so far.
Seemingly it’s £40 a seat for non-ST holders to watch a game played on astro in a 10k-seater stadium.
Category 4 standard adult tickets start lower at £29, the premium Category 1 or Category 2 grandstand seating options generally range from £35 to £45 for a non-season ticket holder depending on the exact block chosen in the Main Stand or Lothian Stand
Had a great day oot wae BRRB and others….hoping yer ok J…I can be too much lol
Great to see & speak to BlantyreTim…he’s still making a difference
Current Celtic..I reserve judgement
H.H.
Paul 67
You are beginning to sound like me! If you write a book I have all the reference material you will need.
I may have linked to this I have done so many the last week the fridge is sausage bare but as to one of his claims, perhaps repeated in his Souness Podcast, his claim about paying the bill if HMRC had not kept increasing it, the fact is in 2008 he took a punt the tax case would rule in his favour and again in 2008 when he could have paid HMRC he took a punt on players to win 3 titles rather than pay HMRC.
Proof of the financial position in 2008 is at this link on Sheet 1
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1YW-eE-Jksy2Tq1gQwxXdKC-WC-fA7jSl/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=107947982974245186134&rtpof=true&sd=true
and on player trading 2008/09 on sheet 2.
There is a lot more where that came from if you e mail me.
BT is a star
Back to Basics – Glass Half Full on 2nd October 2026 1:37 pm
An overall comparison between the Man City Case and Rangers.
Manchester City’s charges expressly included duties to provide accurate financial information and cooperate with investigations “in the utmost good faith.” They also included failure to disclose full player and manager remuneration, and breaches of financial controls.
Point of comparison Manchester City charges LNS charges
Undisclosed remuneration Full player and manager payments Player payments and side-letter arrangements
Cooperation with investigators Express duties of cooperation and utmost good faith Failure to supply requested information timeously
Financial regulation UEFA requirements and Premier League spending controls Contract disclosure and registration rules; LNS expressly distinguished these from financial regulation
General good-faith allegation Expressly included No equivalent standalone allegation in the listed issues
Those distinctions appear in the Premier League’s charge announcement and the LNS Decision and its appended Notice of Commission. premierleague.com
The qualification matters: LNS did examine the administrators’ conduct. Paragraph 110 says they failed to discharge Rangers’ obligations to the football authorities, causing a breach. Rangers received an admonition for that failure.
So the strongest comparison is that City’s case expressly examined good faith, whereas LNS’s cooperation charge focused on timely production of information.
Its in table form so all over the place to post here but can be read at
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kl-fQzTAhurYOvXh-tsaLVkbhlOSMg_S/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=107947982974245186134&rtpof=true&sd=true
with this summary
Those distinctions appear in the Premier League’s charge announcement and the LNS Decision and its appended Notice of Commission. premierleague.com
The qualification matters: LNS did examine the administrators’ conduct. Paragraph 110 says they failed to discharge Rangers’ obligations to the football authorities, causing a breach. Rangers received an admonition for that failure.
So the strongest comparison is that City’s case expressly examined good faith, whereas LNS’s cooperation charge focused on timely production of information.
How utmost good faith got swerved is interesting. Watch this space.
Been an age since I seen you Bada…mibbe nxt week?
H.H.
Blogger GM
Terrible sight lines and not much atmosphere for your £40 also.
An Dun
Sensing your salivating at the very idea of Celtic losing this season. Weird kind of Celtic supporter.
Get help.
On Celtics reticence to get R2ngers really punished including title stripping i think it would have been very different had they won the 10 in a row!!
Must admit to being able to stomach only a few minutes of the Souness-Murray lovefest. The first, who hailed the Ayrshire Rag n Bone Man* as the greatest Chairman in British football, ignoring the fact that he brought Rangers FC to the edge of oblivion, and the second who started his schpiel, criticising BDO the veritable body who brought RFC to a final liquidation and dissolution, on October 17 2024. Now, in a decent democratic society, or even a mid 19th century one Murray would be languishing in a Victorian Debtors Prison. But, thanks to the Son of the Manse, Gordon ‘Pa’ Broon, who advocated his knighthood, and demanded that Lloyds Bank, take over the failing Bank of Scotland, benefactor to both Rangers FC & MIH, no friend of Celtic FC, in an attempt to prevent both from ending up in the dustbin of history where they both belong. And, had it not been for the virtual nationalisation of Lloyds Bank, said Bank would have joined them. And yet Murray, £1.25 billion in debt was allowed to keep some of the assets that Lloyds, as MIH’s Administrator, should have sold against MIH indebtedness, instead of which it chose to swap debt for equity in a Company which was wholly bankrupt, a state of affairs for which Murray had been given a Knighthood, in July 2007.
The Charlatan of Charlotte Square……then and now
Ref Murray
I could provide a few chapters from peak ego period for the book for sure.
Horrible type but to be fair his advisors and senior team did a first class job of ring fencing and developing the asset base he was able to salvage.
This shows the way in which ego and football can make even the smartest of folks do very stupid things…..esp where a dollop of arrogance is added to the mix.
TheLurkinTim- maybe next month amigo, a lot going on this end mate HH
Final point re Murray’s recent outburst.
If I were a rangers fan I would be raging with Murray even more than before after this interview.
Superb result and even better performance by Michael O’Neils side tonight. Huge credit to him and those responsible for developing NI football.
JAMES1955 on 2ND OCTOBER 2026 5:25 PM
An Dún on 2nd October 2026 4:05 pm
JAMES1955 on 2ND OCTOBER 2026 3:39 PM
Who said that ?
—
No one, James. Best ignored, mate.
***********
I know. Usual lies and bull**** from the Burnley Board Bum Chum Clique.
Oh no.
‘Mon the Celtic bum chums. A much better afternoon watching the game with them than An Dun and his mate James1955
‘Mon the Celtic “strange fans”
The weirdos, outsiders, intruders and unwelcomes.
Congratulating the occupied 6 ?
Would spit on the traitors.
Celtic40me…..us ;-))
H.H.
Well done to the ACSOM guys for getting Brendan booked for Royal Concert Hall,sold out in under an hour
Here’s hoping tickets were cheap as chips and there were no booking fees?
Burnley78 on 2nd October 2026 9:41 pm
Final point re Murray’s recent outburst. If I were a rangers fan I would be raging with Murray even more than before after this interview.
*The reason they never say anything about him is that it would negate their cheating lying thieving NIAR.
Hopefully any proceeds are going to charity?
Man City for Dummies, present company excepted, except for those others do not except.
Fight it oot.
https://x.com/Tenbaldi/status/2106079542439715143?s=20
Burnley78 on 2nd October 2026 9:38 pm
Ref Murray
A quote from Soccernomics* ” As oil is to the oil industry, so is stupidity to football.”
*
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0G3BLYHNB/?bestFormat=true&k=soccernomics&ref_=nb_sb_ss_w_scx-ent-bk-v2_k0_1_12_de&crid=323NWR92QSFK1&sprefix=Soccernomics
When I post links is it too much effort to open them or read them after opening?
M Scott Peck has a very interesting theory on human nature in this respect.
To the right hand side of the blog (on a full screen layout) it lists the “POPULAR” articles from this site. Most are over a decade old and many center around commentary on the old Rangers or Sevco debacle of the time.
The Man City story has brought Paul67 back to some of his best work, and this article, as well others over the last few days, have shown up well. Except of course for the predictable shade thrown over BR (this is becoming progressively more embarrassing).
I think that the appearance of Souness and Murray is no surprise given their personalities, and there are others who’ve been offering their thoughts to anyone that will listen. Ignoring the false wisdom of the handpicked puppets, I’d like to see more press coverage reflecting on the old Rangers fiasco, from a club and governance perspective, and how it could have influenced the actions of Man City.
If you consider how the old Rangers strategy failed, it really came down to 2 things; their transgressions apropos HMRC, and lack of capital.
Old Rangers never anticipated the appetite HMRC had for unravelling their scheme to obtain a favorable legal ruling. Tax authorities create “point in time” regulations, and these often do not evolve to keep pace with the changing environment to which they are designed to apply, so they rely heavily on legal process to prosecute entities operating in the grey areas of tax law, with the goal of setting precedence. Old Rangers took bad advice because it suited their business plan, and HMRC saw an opportunity to make an example of them.
As for the over-leveraged business of old Rangers, the hubris of Murray caused them to keep gambling rather than being prudent, and he simply did not have the capital to address the situation as debts started to crystalize. While all of this contributed to an inevitable date with destiny, it was ironically compounded by the weak governance of the SPL and SFA. Although old Rangers initially benefited from lack of proper scrutiny, it eventually contributed to the size of the hole in which they found themselves.
As for Man City, it appears they expended significant effort on their tax strategy and simply thought they had built a better mousetrap, and there was, is, never will be, a shortage of available capital (not guaranteeing that it will deployed. So, they created a system whereby they could circumvent oversight of the EPL, and at the same time stay within the requirements of proper financial reporting and tax compliance. They might have thought that they were capable of maintaining this illusion without challenge, though the scale of their abuse became impossible to fully conceal.
Despite all of this, if retrospective taxes and penalties became due, these could easily be covered, and at the same time, if the EPL chose to sanction them, then they probably expected that this could be navigated. HMRC will ultimately accept money without a “pound of flesh”, but the EPL appears to show signs that integrity of the game could become a factor dictating due process. This is in no small part affected by the overwhelming sentiment of fans, and very specifically the fans of the other big clubs who feel most harmed by City’s actions.
There is yet another interesting parallel between old Rangers and Man City, as they each experienced their respective “house of cards” moments precipitated by a single individual. For old Rangers it was indeed the City of London Police investigation into the Jean-Alain Boumsong deal. For City, it was the extraordinarily motivated hacker, Rui Pinto, who bristled when the Roberto Mancini deal did not pass the sniff test. This was not helped when Mancini’s City team faced FC Porto in a high-profile UEFA Europa League Round of 32 matchup during the 2011–12 season. Directly thereafter, serious structural and financial problems began to accumulate for FC Porto as they battled charges of corruption and financial issues for over a decade. Rui Pinto is a fan of FC Porto.
Whatever happens, none of this will lead to a review of the LNS commission, its rulings at the time, or examination of the work done by the SPL and SFA. But, there is a distinct difference between these two scenarios.
It appears no Man City players are implicated, or being accused of knowingly participating in illegal schemes, and there is no evidence of active player conspiracy, while even Mancini properly insulated himself from allegations. This contrasts starkly with the old Rangers situation. While the executive and owner master minded the side letter strategy, every manager during the period, and every player who received an EBT were doing so in full knowledge that these were of questionable probity at best. Bottom line, for me the whole of Ibrox was corrupt, or “with knowledge”, and their cheating was intrinsic to their very operation. We should, as a club (under fan pressure if needs be), be demanding that the medals be returned, or otherwise subject any individual to the tax consequences of keeping that medal, based on their tolerance for financial penalty. A deal should be struck with HMRC in advance requiring that, through prosecution orchestrated at the expense of Celtic FC, monies recovered should be split equally between the crown and the Celtic Foundation, while medals returned should be deposited in the “Cheating Bassas” exhibit at the SFA museum.
This may appear vindictive, but I’ve likely got significantly fewer years ahead of me than I do behind me, so I’d take great pleasure in extracting some compensation for the pain and suffering of the decade plus when the Ibrox outfit were doing their thing.
Gedinte on 3rd October 2026 12:37 am
In the link to the tax bill dates and transfer business previously reminds me, whose auld man was a street bookie, that Murray took a punt on winning the big tax case to enable another punt that would allow Rangers to pay the BTC bill from 3 years CL participation.
On SPFL not revisiting LNS there is new information in respect of Duff and Phelps, being tested for accuracy, that may not see LNS revisited by SPL/SFA but will let every Tim dismiss The LNS Commission and its Decisions as unreliable.
The SPL might even have a look as what appears took place takes them and their lawyers off the hook.
Celtic and the other SPFL clubs might not be interested but that too will depend on whether their supporters tell their club bosses they want a revisit. It is matter of getting the issue discussed outside the Celtic /Rangers social media bubble.
There is another line on Doncaster and the same club myth that asks questions of him and what lead he got from the other clubs at the time.
The fat lady has not yet cleared her throat.
Celtic40me: You obviously have no idea of A Dun’s Celtic supporting credentials. Even if you had, why not keep snide comments to your own personal mollification and not put them in print on a ‘Celtic supporters’ blog.
There’s a good chap.
Attempt4 shortened!
Celtic 40 me; You obviously no nothing of A Dun’s Celtic supporting ‘credentials’. Why not try scratching your bum rather than make ludicrous, ill informed comments about fellow Celtic men and women?