Last night my brother reminded me of a comment he made after the 0-0 against Benfica on match day one of the Champions League, “I hope we’re not sitting with one point after five games”. Expectations can be as high as you like, but reality based on experience at that stage suggested Celtic would struggle to have more than a single point at this stage of the tournament.
A solitary point away from home in our Champions League history would lead the harsh realists to expect our trips to Lisbon, Barcelona and Moscow would be fruitless, leaving the enormous matter of tackling Barcelona at Celtic Park.
Two of those away games resulted in defeat, and we were behind in Moscow before one of the most significant fight-backs in modern Celtic history. It’s difficult to find perspective for the win over Barcelona. Suffice to say, they won 0-2 in Lisbon and 0-3 in Moscow. Celtic’s 2-1 remains the most astonishing result of this season’s Champions League.
Manchester City’s failure to qualify for the knock out stage, with their seemingly limitless budget, tells the story of how difficult this tournament is. England’s other mega-wealthy club, reigning European champions Chelsea, sacked their manager this week as the expectation they are likely to be eliminated at this stage dawned.
Beating Spartak and qualifying for the knockout stage will be suitable reward for a remarkable team.
The very first CQN Annual is NOW in stock and shipping order yours here! P.S. it’s great.
In case you missed the story, check out the Celtic Trust’s ‘Stand up for the Green Brigade‘ call on the 12th minute on Saturday. Full details on the Trust’s site.
P.P.S. Stand up for the Green Brigade.
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Auldheid
Ogilvie was a high-up at both Rangers and the SFA. The figures these two organisations had on their files regarding the money Rangers players were receiving did not tally.
Ogilvie’s defence amounts to: ‘How was I to know?’
This is the same as saying: ‘You could not expect me, a highly paid football administrator, who got a gig at the national association thanks to my administrating abilities, to have a grasp of the way the club I worked for administered its football operations.’
snake plissken
11:44 on
23 November, 2012
The last thing I’m worried about is the LL……..they will never change, and they are to be congratulated for their major contribution to the Liquidation of rfc ……… I still smile when I recall …..” OFF THE RADAR WEALTH ” (they could have stopped Agent Whyte in his tracks)
Hahahahahahahahahahahaha…….!!!!!!!!!
BRTH,
Thank you for that. Quite possibly the best article I have read on CQN. Absolutely fascinating. Where does it leave us with regard to justice being seen to be done?
Good morning CQN (big Joe says it better)
Well I have been a bit out of circulation this week and have missed what has been an interesting week.
With regards to the tax case verdict its clear that HMRC made a few criticial mistakes. Its clear the EBT arrangement was a scam and they should hve gone for them on that. In truth not much has changed – we all know that the EBT was a scam and so do they.
They feel exonerated but the case was decidied on technicalities.
What hasnt changed is that they engaged in massive tax evasion or avoidance. Morally corrupt to the core. Whether it was deemed illegal or not they are dead and no matter what spin they put on it their history died with them.
The most interesting part in all of this is the MSM and the Scottish Establishment. Lets take the MSM first. Throughout this debacle they have refused to investigate (with a few notable exceptions) and they have spun stories. They helped Craig Whyte put the final nails in the coffin of Rangers by being their normal sychophantic selves.
And they have learned nothing
I had the displeasure of listerning to Traynor’s rants this week and its clear to me that he is nothing more than a hun spokesman.
Not once has any of the MSM in their rush to gush over the poor huns stepped back and thought about the morality of their tax evasion scheme. Not once. The mood of the UK public for tax evasion by big companies is growing ever darker – and companies are scurrying about like rats less the public act and stop buying their products. But for the huns its all fab because they got off with tax evasion on a technicality. Its like the murderer or rapist getting off because the prosecution lawyer made a mistake. Then giving the rapist a big cuddle cos that means he is innocent.
Its sickening but predictable. But I have a better way of getting this on the table.
Mr Salmond has said nothing about this. He is in a difficult place here. His instinct is to gush like the rest of the MSM. But the tax evasion mood in the UK is bad. If he gushes and someone points out he is praising tax evasion he is in trouble. So my friends get along to see your MSP and ask him/her what their party’s stance is on tax evasion – when you get the normal “I abhor it” stance then ask why they arent condeming the big tax case decision and decrying THE SUBSTANCE of what the huns did. It will work a wee treat that.
Then we come to the SFA and general football authorities. Its awful that CO is still there and now they want to reinvent him because the huns got off on a technicality.
Lets go back to basics for a second. Celtic fans en masse have known there has been an unsaid conspiracy to support the hun cause for all of my lifetime. For knowing this we have been accused of being paranoid and mentally ill. If you just look at some of the more recent events the conspiracy mask has slipped somehwat. From farrygate to the “Dougie Dougie” incident to the death of the huns we have seen some disasterous posturing and some real insight into what goes on the the corridors of power in scottish football and scottish society.
And what we see now is something for them to rally behind again and to maintain this conspiracy. We will soon be back to being called paraniod etc. But we will know the truth.
So here we are – it appears that Scotland doesnt want to learn from its mistakes does it?
Anyway – are the GB still on a boycott tomorrow?
Quotes from member of public but i won’t give names.
I’m afraid that you, like – it seems – everyone else, have entirely missed the point of the Ramsay principle.
Broadly, it can require some arrangements to be taxed according to commercial substance rather than legal form.
Ramsay is the crux of the case. ***** is wrong to say that the decision is correct because HMRC didn’t argue sham.
Satisfying the criteria for the application of the Ramsay principle is much less burdensome than proving a sham.
67 Heaven
It doesn’t stop them from being annoying and creating their assertions as fact. That is my point.
I saw Heidi Poon and the Ramsay Principle a few years back, at the ooooooooooooooolllllllllle Burns Howff.
What a complete waste of time and money that was.
Read the FTT ruling whilst waiting [ and waiting ] at Rome airport —
The Law is the Law but sometimes it truly is a tethered ass . The number cruncher knows the score —-
Reminded me of a guy in my ” Rooms ” being busted with a kilo of bush in 1968 . Prosecution led with the evidence of a kilo of bush in a Cornflakes box being found in his room . His defense successfully proved that the prosecution had a problem — there was no kilo of bush in a Cornflakes packet but there was a kilo of bush in a Weetabix box . . Evidently a wee problem — Guy walked .
University was less understanding — guy was thrown out for breaking the rules of the University .
Snake Plissken
What infuriates me is that their whole debt reduction policy was based on CL money.
Debt was very manageable in 2006 at £6m but rocketed to £31M by 2009 because of the players Smith brought in to win the titles that gave them access to CL money to reduce the debt.
When your whole business policy is based on borrowing (which funded the player purchases) in order to service the sum borrowed, then all it takes to put your over the cliff is to fail to get at the income the borrowing made possible.
That of course is exactly what happened in 2011 when having got a UEFA licence in spite of an unpaid (and still unpaid) wee tax bill, they went out to Malmo and Maribor.
Nothing to do with tax and all to do with wreckless (see what I did there) financial polcies that not only ruined them but deprived competitors of the very cash that would have enabled them to challenge for the titles and so break the cycle. It was full scale cheating because there was never any intention of repaying what was borrowed, much like an ebt loan eh?
It was this total dependence on CL money after 2008 that created the conditions where honest mistakes left the traditional sectarian suspicion territory and entered a purely financial one. It stopped being about gloating rights and became all about their survival and that all but killed Scottish football whilst they still died.
They are desperately trying to bury this aspect of the story and will succeed unless HMRC and BDO do their jobs and pursue the actual Rangers downfall story to the end.
SoT
What the heck kind of a University was that … ?
To allow Cornflakes but not Weetabix?
Cerealoffenders.CSC
These university breakfasr regulations are a real maize for the unwary.
kilo in the bush is worth two in the Weetabix box
DBBIA —
90 mins of Mo watched in the company of my elderly Inter supporting neeb He was in a bad mood having watched Inter Under 21s being humped by Rubin Kazan .
Said bad mood led him to say some very uncharitable things about Bang Bang — eg
” Watching him trying to control the ball is like watching you trying to eat spaghetti without a spoon “.
The woman from Padova liked that one and said — ” wow -that bad ? “
I also demand to know Mr. Thomson’s name!
DBBIA
I think you’re assessment of Heidi and Friends is both flawed and unkind.
History is likely to show that oor Heidi was way ahead of her time and very far from being a waste of time or money …
FF
BRTH excellent post and translation of the FTT decision. Many thanks.
Celtic First
Exactly. It defies belief he was unsighted.
What is the term? Plausible deniability?
However If he/the SFA did not really know of side letter arrangement he/SFA should have been asked. That they were not is an indication of intent by Rangers to conceal because a negative decision would have stopped side letters being issued and players would not have signed, negating the footballing value of the ebt arrangement.
You can see why there is a clamour to drop the Nimmo enquiry, it WILL prove Rangers guilt if honestly undertaken (a necessary caveat unfortuneatly) but could clear Ogilve.
Bush in a Weetabix box? Try Sugar Smack, it’s grrrrrrrrrreat!!!
tonythetigerCSC
To concede on SDM means admitting they were royally conned for 20 yrs. And thanked and eulogised him for it. Were it not for cultural and religious impediment he would be Saint David Murray in their eyes.
Auldheid I agree with what you say and would add that as soon as they started selling future gate money at an enormous discount it was a timebomb ticking away. Regardless of whether or when Craig Whyte knew about this he had no choice but to follow suit.
The change to the CL qualifying rounds has benefited Celtic this year.
In previous years it benefited the SPL Champions because it made it very likely they would be the sole representatives and recipients of extra cash because of that.
So the title had to be won at all costs.
A game of cards for very high stakes. The “big hoose” being the final wager.
South of Tunis
Was the kilo of bush ‘well trimmed?’
HH!!
Heidi POON…
…FENIAN ARMY!!!
Snake Plissken
11:20 on 23 November, 2012
Auldheid
What I find mad is how they believe the Bog Tax case prevented them from being sold.
Do they not remember the bank debt of 30 million in 2010 which went down to 18 the Craig Whyte paid off via Ticketus?
Any buyer actually had to pay that. It was a crystal clear debt as was the wee tax case.
Jabba continually spouts that the debt was coming down and Lloyds were happy with the £18m. The £18m didn’t even include the 4m WTC. It would have gone way back up into the high 20s without CL participation the following season.
And more to the point – if Lloyds were happy with the debt why would Whyte have gone to all that trouble with Ticketus to pay off every last penny of it?
Very interesting ???!!!
http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Poon
HH!!
new article posted.
Tallybhoy .
It was Colombian not Brazilian .
On Side Letters.
Would players have signed any contract without a side letter? Clearly no or none would have been needed
Could Rangers have risked a no answer from SFA as that would have torpedoed the object of the scheme?
Thus side letters had to be kept from SFA not because they were not about payment but because SFA might say that they were under SFA rules.
Thus Rangers could not afford to take the risk of asking SFA. In doing so they usurped SFA authority by deciding the matter themselves.
How on earth such an important decision re the nature of ebt payments as the SFA would see them was not referred to the SFA from the outset is unbelievable, unless of course Rangers feared the answer they would get under the principles of footballing fair play the SFA rules were intended to uphold.
Testing testing
hi lads,hope this is the right thread.
Tight Knit Wolv 8.50
good luck
Pepite Rose 3.20 Ascot for me today … good luck all.
Waabel 1.20 Lingfield
GBNL
Annelko 920 wolves.
Pepite Rose 3:20 Ascot good luck
sorry Cathal another 10 pound’s on it’s back.
Aiming to get off the mark today with Etxalar – Haydock 3.40
Haydock 2.30 Sivola De Sivola
good luck
Ascot 320 Tanks for That
Good luck everyone
Ring For Baileys, 3.00 Lingfield. First winner on a streak this time.
Morning all, going for All Annalena 1.40 at ascot.
Good luck all. Too many all’s in that post,where’s my thesaurus ?