Much of the response from Duff and Phelps to last night’s revelations by Mark Daly on the BBC website centred around their fees. BBC revealed that partner, David Grier, emailed Craig Whyte to say, “We propose to cap our fees in respect of an (sic) CVA or Administration to £500k, however, we request the ability to discuss with you an additional payment in respect of our total time costs, in so far as this does not impact on your position.”
Contracting to cap fees at £500k when you subsequently bill creditors £3.5m for your own time plus £2m legal costs would embarrass many of us, though not everyone. Duff and Phelps added a caveat that they could discuss additional payment as long as it did not impact on Craig Whyte’s position, which they perhaps did.
The more interesting part of the exchange between Whyte and Greir is their preparation for “HMRC being hostile”.
Craig Whyte:
“I’d like to speak to David [Whitehouse] and Paul [Clark] to make sure that they’re comfortable with the fact that we might end up with HMRC being hostile (I suspect this will end up being the case so you should go into it with your eyes open)”
David Grier:
“Agreed.”
It is fascinating to wonder how comfortable Mr Whitehouse and Mr Clark were with Craig Whyte’s plans in the event HMRC were hostile. HMRC are Rangers largest creditors. Administrators run the company in the interests of the creditors, not the shareholders.
Three days after this email exchange Rangers went to court to insist Duff and Phelps were appointed administrators instead of an appointment by HMRC.
Last week Duff and Phelps denied they have a conflict of interest concerning this administration. They are currently negotiating a CVA with HMRC and other creditors.
E-lites are opening a concession on the first floor of Buchanan Galleries tomorrow. They are giving away a free copy of CQN Magazine to customers throughout June, while stocks last.
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And for anyone who has under-estimated the scale of their own goal, imagine trying to sell the dream of an independent Scotland to voters in Scotland, that didn’t even have its own recognised national football team? Salmond’s troosers must be brooner than doncasters !
HH
Remember myself and a friend repeatedly hammering two denizens of Darvel at pool (doubles), in Kilmarnock, we could tell they were extremely angry but unfortunately the only words we could understand were the ones tattooed on their arms as they seemed to speak in hurumphs n grunts.
Monaghan1900 on 31 May, 2012 at 19:58 said:
Absolutely …. I was hoping it would be the same 3….
I hope it was a ‘slip’, or I’m just hearing things, but SSN have just reported that ” rankers will not face ANY additional action for taking the matter to court” ……….. ??????????
Hmmm… SFA statement could mean two entirely different things
1. Right, RFC, we tried to be nice last time, but no more Mr Nice Guy from us. Prepare for suspension/expulsion.
2. Erm, ok, no Scottish Cup next year…?
Surely Reagan hasn’t been daft enough to put this out without consulting with FIFA first? But on the other hand, the independent tribunal are on the record as saying that they considered expulsion too harsh last time round…
I can see a massive climb-down coming. Unless FIFA are being true to their “Sion principles”.
Celticdonnelly posted this link at 17.48. It is unlikely (!!) to have its counterpart in the country where Neil Lennon plies his trade. I have also included one comment. An interesting take on no open top bus procession.
“Man or Ball? The Challenges of Lennon
Posted May 31, 2012 by Prefontaine in Sport
Ask three time AFL premiership coach Mick Malthouse, or three time Super Bowl winner Bill Belichick if it is easy managing an elite professional sporting team and they will tell you to go root your boot. It’s a difficult business.
But neither Malthouse nor Belichick dealt with the kind of pressure the current man in charge of Scottish football giants Celtic – Neil Lennon – has had to deal with.
Arguably, managing either two of Glasgow’s ancient rivals, Celtic or Rangers, is one of the toughest gigs in world football. The white hot heat of Glasgow has seen managers of excellent pedigree choke in this football cauldron. Just ask Paul le Guen.
In early April when Celtic secured their first League Championship in four years and their 43rd in 124 years of competitive football, Neil Lennon joined an elite group of people to lead Celtic to a league championship.
This was a special moment for Lennon. He’d been through so much to get there.
The day to day challenges of a manager, like injuries and dealing with players out of form would seem a welcome relief from the appalling level of sectarian and racial abuse Lennon suffered as both a Celtic player and manager. This added stress is a foreign concept to the rest of the modern sporting world, but for Neil Lennon it became a terrible reality when he signed for the club in December 2000.
Prior to that date, Neil Lennon was just another talented hard tackling, defensive midfielder plying his trade for Leicester City in the English Premier League.
At Celtic, Lennon proved to be an invaluable cog in the side under Martin O’Neil that returned Celtic to the top of Scottish football and went some way to restoring European glory days to Paradise.
Lennon grew up on the streets of Lurgan supporting Celtic. His passion and drive for the game was sometimes accompanied by a fiery, red-hot temper. Lennon will admit he was no angel, at times getting in the face of opponents, referees and even his own team mates if he thought they weren’t pulling their weight on the park.
But in the early days of his Celtic career, a sinister undercurrent of hatred was developing against Lennon and not because of his competitive nature.
These are the simple facts. Neil Lennon is a Catholic, born and raised in Northern Ireland, and played for Glasgow Celtic.
Before he signed for Celtic, Lennon he had won over 35 international caps for Northern Ireland.
But in his first international against Norway after signing for Celtic in February 2001, Lennon played the first half of the match at Belfast’s Windsor Park to a chorus of boos, cat calls and sectarian abuse from the home fans.
For the uninitiated, the majority of the Protestant – Unionist community in the north support the Northern Ireland national football team. Many, but not all of the Catholic – Republican community no longer support Northern Ireland, fatigued by the constant abuse that Catholic players cop from the mainly Protestant home support. Across the water, Celtic has strong links to its Irish roots, where as Rangers are the team of the Scottish Protestant establishment.
Days before that match against Norway, graffiti appeared on a wall in Lennon’s home town of Lurgan with the words RIP Neil Lenon (sic) scrawled under a drawing of a hanged man. This small act sent two clear messages; that Lennon was no longer welcome in the international team and that more focus was needed to lift the literacy levels of the Protestant community in Lurgan.
Simply being a Catholic from Northern Ireland and playing professional football for Celtic was too much to bear for those mindless bigoted, racist, so-called fans of football.
Lennon wasn’t the first Catholic to play for Northern Ireland, nor was he the first to receive abuse from the home fans for being so. Several other Catholics have played for Northern Ireland through the years including then Celtic Manager, Martin O’Neil.
O’Neill, when walking out onto the pitch to a howl of boos from the Windsor Park crowd before a World Cup qualifier, once remarked to a team mate, “I’ve been booed off the park before, but never onto it.”
Months later, on the eve of Northern Ireland playing Cyprus in a European Championship qualifier, Lennon was named captain for the match due to injuries suffered by several key players.
On the morning of the game as the Northern Irish team went through their paces, the Police Service of Northern Ireland arrived at the training ground and informed Lennon the BBC had received a phone call from someone proclaiming to be from the Loyalist Volunteer Force – a unionist terrorist group. They threatened that if Lennon captained the game for Northern Ireland “he would get hurt.”
This was no joke. The violence in the north had seen thousands of people murdered in cold blood across three decades, and Lennon was not about to become another victim of The Troubles.
Lennon never played for Northern Ireland again.
From 2000 until 2007 Lennon marshalled the Celtic midfield, winning five league titles, three Scottish Cups medals, two League Cup medals and one UEFA Cup runners up medal. All the while, he received vitriolic abuse from fans at every away stadium across Scotland every time he touched the ball.
When Lennon was abused by fans at away grounds, two atrocities were committed against him. The first by the faceless bigots in the stands, and the other by the Scottish media who failed to expose these people for what they were.
What made it worse was the way the media defended these fans stumping up arguments masquerading as banter, or worse, that Lennon brought it upon himself.
At a derby match in late November 2004, Lennon was subject to 90 minutes of sectarian and racial abuse that exceeded the traditional toxic atmosphere of a Celtic v Rangers fixture.
It was enough to motivate a normally restrained Martin O’Neil to publicly support his midfielder in front of the Celtic fans at Ibrox. “Neil Lennon, for what ever reason, suffers dogs abuse at every single away ground and in particular here obviously… it was to show that Neil Lennon is very popular with our fans, I didn’t want anyone to forget that.”
In calling out the racial abuse metered by Rangers supporters, O’Neil broke a social taboo – highlighting racial and religious intolerance in Scottish society. It was the equivalent of kicking a bees nest.
Scottish journalists are usually reluctant to weigh into the sectarian debate, but on this occasion they went into a frenzy against the Celtic midfielder. It prompted a rare rebuke by Times journalist, Phil Gordon, against his colleagues from the fourth estate.
“The newspapers that have ganged together to pursue Lennon have treated him with contempt. There is an agenda at work, selling papers might be one justification, but there appears to be a darker motivation.”
In 2007, Lennon left Celtic to play out his final days in the lower leagues of England.
In 2008, he returned to Celtic in a back room role after illness struck Celtic great Tommy Burns.
Lennon received a welcome return to life in Glasgow when he and his girlfriend were assaulted in a sectarian motivated attack in Glasgow’s west end by two Rangers fans. The two men received a two year jail sentence.
Back on the park, Celtic’s 2009/10 season was in tatters. Lennon was brought in to replace Tony Mowbray as caretaker manager until the end of the season. The following season, Lennon was given the task of returning the league title to Parkhead after two wayward seasons.
Trying to wrestle the league title back from your greatest rival is an onerous challenge in itself, but Lennon’s first full season in charge of the club was met with more challenges off the park, than on it. These events would blacken the name of not only Scottish football, but society as a whole.
After a particularly venomous derby match against Rangers, filled with racially charged anthems about the famine and the Pope, the Royal Mail intercepted packages containing bullets. They were addressed to Lennon and Northern Irish internationalist Niall McGinn and Paddy McCourt, both Catholics playing for Celtic.
The following month, Celtic and Rangers faced off again, this time in a Scottish Cup reply at Celtic Park that will forever be known as The Shame Game. Three Rangers players were sent off in a volatile match that ended with Lennon and Rangers manager Ally McCoist being physically separated by match officials.
The aftershock of this match was felt immediately on the streets of Glasgow and in the emergency wards of city hospitals later that night. The behaviour of the Rangers players, including serial head case El Hadji Diouf, simply added to an already poisonous atmosphere in Scotland.
Days later another parcel bomb, addressed to Neil Lennon, was intercepted by Strathclyde police. Later that month, a third nail bomb, intended for Lennon and posted to the club’s training facilities at Lennoxtown, was intercepted by Royal Mail staff. Lennon couldn’t catch a break.
Two high-profile people, a politician and a solicitor, both Celtic supporters, were also sent parcel bombs, and several threats were made against Lennon and his family on Twitter and Facebook.
After these threats, Lennon was subsequently put under 24-hour protection and on several occasions was moved from his home in the middle of the night by police.
This sad and sorry affair invaded the field of play on May 11, when Celtic faced the Edinburgh club, Heart of Midlothian at Tynecastle.
With Celtic up 2-0, a Hearts fan jumped from the main stand into the technical area and attacked Lennon on the touch line.
The attack on Lennon by the Hearts fan that night in the capital debunked the myth purported by politicians and media that sectarianism and racial intolerance against Irish Catholics was restricted to the west of Scotland.
The events of 2011 were a tragic reflection on Scotland. The actions by those who abused Lennon each week from the safety of the terracing, or assaulted him on the street or inside a football stadium, or the cowards that sent death threats and parcel bombs in the mail highlight that Scottish society is struggling to accept a community that has been migrating across the Irish Sea since the 19th century.
This dated attitude towards race relations in modern Scotland has been accurately described as Scotland’s Shame by University of Aberdeen academic Tom Devine.
It would be unfair to brand the many accepting and progressive Scots as bigots and racists. After all, it was this forward thinking nation that gave us the Enlightenment and inventions like penicillin and the telephone.
Yet this is a nation that still can’t embrace a community that identifies as Irish and practices the ‘dark arts’ of Catholicism.
Thankfully, the 2011/12 season was far more sedated than the previous. Sure the Rangers song book hasn’t changed, but the off field incidents that threatened to see Celtic or its fans walk away from the game have subsided.
More significantly, Neil Lennon didn’t walk away. No sports fan would’ve begrudged him if he did. Instead the Irishman demonstrated an amazing amount of focus, courage and character to mould a young, talented group of footballers to be crowned champions. After all, isn’t it supposed to be about sport?”
JJ
PS The comment has not appeared. I will post it again in a minute.
The comment:
“22 Orange walks in Glasgow this weekend, TWENTY TWO & yet we are not allowed to have an open bus tour for winning the league. Scandalous!”
Monaghan1900 on 31 May, 2012 at 20:22 said:
I don’t think the SFA had any choice other than to attend the court.
Larrybhoy on 31 May, 2012 at 20:19 said:
The view from Daniel Pike – what a programme
Roddy McMillan – what an actor. Great as Para Handy too.
Usually when a successful actor moves from comedy to drama then you find it hard to take him seriously. I think it was the glint in his eye as Daniel Pike that carried it.
more than 20 orange order parades in Glasgow this weekend.to commemorate the queens 60 years on throne.Daughter and two sons live in Glasgow but i will not be visiting Saturday or Sunday
H H
I’m sure this has been mentioned already from Reagans statement: “With our annual general meeting taking place on Wednesday 6 June, it will be appropriate to remind member clubs that by very dint of their membership of the Scottish FA, they accept and abide by the Articles of Association.”
Unless you’re Rangers in that case do what you like and we’ll do hee haw about it.
Haven’t read all the blog’s offerings today so apologies if posted:
TRAGIC Reamonn Gormley is to be awarded a special posthumous medal recognising him as a “Saint of the 21st century” by the Catholic Church in Scotland.
Cardinal Keith O’Brien will present the Pope Benedict XVI Caritas Award to the murdered student’s parents Ann and Jim.
The Celtic fan, 19, from Blantyre, spent his gap year teaching vulnerable kids in Thailand and is among 450 youngsters to be honoured for volunteering work at a ceremony in Glasgow’s Clyde Auditorium on Saturday.
A spokesman for the Catholic Church said: “In his short life he was a quiet, inspirational force within the school and wider community.”
Haha, look out – here we go…..
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
Some very strange reactions to our press statement tonight. To summarise in bite-sized chunks….
wonkyradar on 31 May, 2012 at 20:02 said:
Wonky, for what its worth (my mantra, cos my opinion – as is right – counts for as little or as much as anybody else on here)…
Ernie is a razor. And I like his posts, because they challenge. They inject a wee bit of tension into the debate, and that forces folk – like your good self – to research and retort.
Ye cannae beat a stooshie
Look at all those ungrammatical conjunctives… pish, I think, I am.
67Heaven
What makes you say SFA had no choice?
Jungle Jim on 31 May, 2012 at 20:26 said:
Never mind, we’ll be able to have an open bus celebration across Scotland next season, with ‘no bhuns no more’ …… No wait …
As with all things twitter, read in reverse
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
2. No appeal will be made to a civil court for a football matter.
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
1. Decision to go back to appeal body who will consider remaining sanctions open to them.
In 2, does he mean SFA will not appeal or RFC should not have done so?
Does he mention an additional sanction for taking the SFA to court in the first place?
Not yet, they’re still coming though
Monaghan1900 on 31 May, 2012 at 20:33 said:
My thinking is that they would have to defend their decision / punishment, and would they not be leaving themselves open to ‘contempt’ by not turning up at court.?……. I’ll get my coat …!!!
The Regan tweets, in full (so far). Again, read in reverse order
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
4. The Judicial Process was never questioned, simply which sanction was selected. Judges had different opinions on what was allowed.
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
3. Two Supreme Court Judges had different opinions on the same point.
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
2. No appeal will be made to a civil court for a football matter.
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
1. Decision to go back to appeal body who will consider remaining sanctions open to them.
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
Some very strange reactions to our press statement tonight. To summarise in bite-sized chunks….
This cannot turn out well for Rangers.
Ernie Lynch is correct. The SFA should not have contested the application to the Court of Session as, in doing so, they gave the appearance of accepting the courts involvement in a footballing matter. I suspect they did so expecting they would win, but that still doesn’t justify their appearance.
In doing so, they also helped light the fire that Fifa cannot allow to take hold. Fifa’s monopoly on football ends as soon as local courts are allowed to exercise their higher authority.
The SFA of course have no option but to acknowledge the finding of the Court of Session, as a higher authority, and refer the matter back to the appellate tribunal.
I expect the appellate tribunal, if it again sits, will now be forced to suspend Rangers, the punishment both the original tribunal and the appellate tribunal sought to avoid.
It cannot end there however. Fifa cannot allow a member club to be seen to have succeeded in making an application to a local court without punishment. They will therefore insist the SFA take further action against Rangers, to serve as a deterrent against other clubs contemplating such action in any other member association.
Only by the administrators belatedly either accepting the initial finding of the appellate tribunal, or seeking recourse from CAS, will they be able to head this off. I would have thought the former is in the best interests of the creditors.
apoligies if all ready posted-
Rangers 10-point penalty ‘meaningless’ says Neil DoncasterNeil Doncaster, SPL chief executive, shares his view with BBC Newsnight Scotland
Continue reading the main story
Related Stories
Gers hand over contract documents
SPL assurances on Rangers’ probe
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The 10-point penalty applied to Rangers for going into administration was “relatively meaningless”, the SPL chief executive has said.
In a BBC interview, Neil Doncaster admitted the SPL had no powers to vet Rangers prospective new owner Charles Green and knew nothing of his backers.
He also said Rangers administrators had not given the co-operation hoped for over the dual contract investigation.
The interview will be shown on Newsnight Scotland on BBC2 at 23:00.
During the BBC interview, Mr Doncaster denied that the SPL was conflicted between its roles of promoting the commercial interests of member clubs and safeguarding the sporting integrity of the competition it administered.
Integrity ‘paramount’
“It’s paramount that people believe in there being effective real competition and the integrity within the league,” he said.
The SPL chief executive said that sporting integrity had not been compromised by Rangers’ administration.
He added: “They’re (Rangers) having to deal with issues that arise for them. We’re then having to respond and react to issues that arise that affect Rangers. In responding to those issues, the integrity of the competition remains paramount.”
Continue reading the main story
“
Start Quote
Any such prosecution which arises from the (EBT) investigation would be in front of a wholly independent panel…without any association to any SPL club”
End Quote
Neil Doncaster
SPL chief executive
Mr Doncaster agreed that the 10-point penalty applied to Rangers for going into administration following non-payment of taxes was “relatively meaningless”.
He stressed, however, that it was the only penalty that could be applied under the current rules, a situation which clubs had begun to address with new sanctions being agreed at a meeting at Hampden on Wednesday.
The new “hard-hitting” sanctions, Mr Doncaster said, would see the greater of 10 points, or a third of the previous season’s points tally, deducted from clubs going into administration from next season.
On Tuesday, Rangers administrators Duff and Phelps issued an offer to creditors for a company voluntary arrangement (CVA).
They hope will be accepted and allow the club to exit administration by 12 July, under the control of a consortium fronted by businessman Charles Green, which currently has preferred bidder status.
If the CVA proposal fails, it is Mr Green’s intention to purchase Rangers assets and set up a new company or newco to take the club forward.
This would involve the SPL approving a transfer of Rangers share and setting any conditions for entry. Approval would also be needed from the SFA as the licensing body.
‘Appropriate sanctions’
Mr Doncaster told BBC Scotland that he was not expecting a Newco application from Rangers as it was the administrators’ view that the CVA proposal “had a reasonable chance of success”.
If one did come forward, he said, “it is for the clubs to determine that decision and for them to impose appropriate sanctions as they see fit at that time”.
The SPL chief executive said that clubs had turned down a proposal to vote through fixed penalties for a newco as they preferred the flexibility to deal with any application on a case-by-case basis.
Continue reading the main story
“
Start Quote
(The SPL) remains the best supported league per head of population anywhere in Europe”
End Quote
Neil Doncaster
SPL chief executive
Mr Doncaster said that the SPL investigation into allegations of dual contracts at Rangers, related to the club’s use of employee benefit trusts (EBTs), “hadn’t had the co-operation that we would have been hoping for” from the club’s administrators.
“I think it was their view that any investigation was more appropriate to take place after the outcome of the big tax case (related to EBT use),” he said.
“Our view, is that we needed to get on with the investigation.”
The SPL confirmed on Thursday that the lawyers appointed to oversee the probe had received documents requested from Rangers.
Mr Doncaster said that he thought the “full information” on dual contracts would “only emerge on the outcome of the big tax case”.
“Ultimately, our board may have to make a decision prior to then, as to whether they have sufficient information at that point to conduct a disciplinary process,” he said.
“What they have made clear though is that any such prosecution which arises from the investigation would be in front of a wholly independent panel and that would be made up of eminent lawyers without any association to any SPL club.”
Fit-and-proper test
The SPL chief executive also said that it was extremely difficult to design a fit-and-proper test for prospective new owners of clubs.
“If you talk about past criminal record, then arguably Ghandi I think had a criminal record, and ultimately he’s be a fit and proper person to run a premier league club in Scotland but he might be forbidden by such an objective test.”
Mr Doncaster said the SPL’s rules did not allow them to vet potential owners and as such no vetting had been carried out on prospective new Rangers owner Charles Green.
He said the SFA did have such a test and that would be an issue for them.
Mr Doncaster also said that he did not know who any of Mr Green’s investors were and admitted that he had not asked either.
“It’s not for us to be involved”, he said, “we deal with the club, not the underlying owners of those clubs.”
The SPL chief executive said that despite headline-grabbing difficulties within the league this season it “remains the best supported league per head of population anywhere in Europe”.
He also rejected claims that the SPL was not for purpose, saying league was “in rude health” and clubs were doing “incredibly well”.
The Neil Doncaster interview will be broadcast on Newsnight Scotland at 23:00. The full version will be available online afterwards.
Stewart M. Regan @StewartRegan
5. A new hearing will take place at the earliest opportunity.
Or see them yourself here (you don’t need a twitter account to view I don’t think)
https://twitter.com/#!/StewartRegan
new article posted.
and anithir-
31 May 2012 Last updated at 14:10 Share this pageEmail Print Share this page
80ShareFacebookTwitter.Rangers hand over documents in SPL contracts probe
Rangers used Employee Benefit Trusts (EBTs) to pay dozens of players Continue reading the main story
Related Stories
SPL assurances on Rangers’ probe
Q&A: EBT schemes explained
EBT beneficiaries
Lawyers investigating allegations that Rangers used dual contracts to pay players have received documents from the club, BBC Scotland has learned.
The Scottish Premier League (SPL) appointed Glasgow law firm Harper McLeod to investigate the claims earlier this year.
Documents were first requested from Rangers in March.
If it is proven that the club used dual contracts against league rules, Rangers could be stripped of titles.
Rangers used Employee Benefit Trusts (EBTs) to pay dozens of players during the last decade.
Tax tribunal
HMRC issued a bill to Rangers for unpaid tax on the schemes, believed to be in the region on £49m, including interest and penalties.
Rangers contested this at a First Tier Tax Tribunal which concluded in January and is due to issue its determination imminently.
It is believed the potential EBT liability facing the Ibrox club, which was placed in administration in February over other unpaid tax totalling £14m, could now be as high as £75m, including penalties and interest.
The SPL investigation centres on whether the EBT payments to players were included on their contracts.
Board meeting
Scottish Football Association (SFA) rules state that all payments made to players in respect of their earnings from football must be declared on one contract. Clubs falling foul of those rules could face sanctions from the league.
The SPL launched its investigation into Rangers’ use of the EBT scheme on 5 March.
The probe covers the period stretching back to the SPL’s inception in 1998.
In a statement, the SPL confirmed it had received documentation from Rangers in relation to the investigation into EBT payments.
“The SPL’s legal team will now review and provide an update to the SPL board at the next SPL board meeting on 18 June,” it said.
Larrybhoy:
Got Sunday’s Child, One World, The Apprentice, Bless the Weather, Glasgow Walker, Solid Air & Grace n Danger all oan the ipod. The man was a one off. A real trailblazer. He is probably the most influential artist who was on the fringes of the mainstream. Yeah, he could be crazy…but sometimes creativity unbalances people. Hard to tell what his best album actually is: personally I love One World. Very ambient.
Hail. Hail.
what rips ma knitting most about this sorry tale is the lack of remorse from the great unwashed. The story still goes that it is all down to a MBB who appeared last year and wrecked this institution.
They have been cheating for over a decade.
All you hear on supporter forums is how they need to rise up, how everyone is against them, how no one likes them (turns out that despite their song they do care) and how blood will spill on the streets, how can they do this to us.
Nobody in their camp has said, you know what, we have been cheating for years, we have won games, leagues and trophies with players we could not afford, we havent paid creditors, we havent paid tax, we have dubious accountacy practices, we have played hard and loose with the rules, we deserve punishment.
so far they have had the mandatory 10 points and only other punishment is 160k fine they cannot/will not pay. Yet they are incandescent with rage and how they are being picked on, with the usual sense of entitlement that only a rangers fan can manage.
scotlands shame? more like no shame. Up til now I wanted them punished but still there so we could lord it over them.
Now? maybe they should just eff off and die. quietly.
If they cannot give a softer punishment and they cannot give a transfer ban then what can they give other than suspension or expulsion that would realistically look like a punishment?
A transfer ban on signings other than frees?
The bould Hector’s bhoys
My younger daughter is receiving an award at the award ceremony on Saturday.
Very much looking forward to it.
Hey there Larrybhoy!…..have I been ranting today,eh? You would be too if you were as frazzled as I am! A bhig Hail! Hail! to you.
ScratchEmAtYourPeril csc…
67Heaven
Leave yer coat on the peg and sit doon.
It’s not unusual for a party not to enter appearance in a civil matter. No option for an accused in a criminal trial!
I think the reason the SFA entered appearance was that they expected to win the jurisdiction argument.
HH
Jungle Jim on 31 May, 2012 at 20:28 said:
You’ve been shared bud
ElDiegoBhoy on 31 May, 2012 at 20:43 said:
Congratulations to your daughter…..
What’s the award for….putting up with you……..jist jokin, honest
I have sent two tweets to @StewartRegan asking if they will take further action against rfc (ia) so far no response. Any of you on twitter please send the same question.
The world of football is watching.
Keep the Faith!
Hail Hail!
Monaghan1900 on 31 May, 2012 at 20:48 said:
Ta !! …….would suggest it would not be very professional for them not to attend………hopefully, the bhuns will now get suspended….
Lennybhoy ……my previous post
I hope it was a ‘slip’, or I’m just hearing things, but SSN have just reported that ” rankers will not face ANY additional action for taking the matter to court” ……….. ??????????
ernie lynch
The SFA acted within its’ own rules and regulation in setting up an Independent Judicial Panel to examine and rule on the findings of bringing the game into disrepute. The Judicial Panel is bound by Scots Law, it is Judge led. Rangers availed themselves the option of appealing against the initial ruling, penalties and sanctions and failed to overturn said decisions in front of the Appelate Panel, itself still a Judicial hearing. At that point the SFA had applied due process and, under its own statutes, rules of association etc, had reached the end of the procedings. Decisions stand. In refusing to accept the decisions of a Judicial Panel following appeal, Rangers FC further breached the SFA rules of association. However, despite Rangers FC, breaking said SFA rules, the fact that the examining panel was Judicial allowed Rangers FC access to the Court of Session, based on application of Scots Law. This would have applied to any similar hearing. Had the SFA adopted its’ own internal disciplinary procedures then Rangers would not have been able to take the case to Edinburgh, the Court of Session would not have had any jurisdiction. Like I said it is a Catch 22 for the SFA. The SFA decided, rightly that, given the seriousness of the rule breaking the panel should not only be seen to be independent but in fact was independent. Rangers FC accepted every stage of the process, including the appeal process, until it went against them. Under said process there was no further avenue open to them. Under said rules! Rangers FC, being Rangers decided to further breach SFA rules. The SFA sought to prove that the Appelate Panel applied, not only the SFA rules of association, but due process throughout. Rangers abused both the rules and the process, and in effect forced the SFA to appear at the Court. No courts were involved prior to this action, and the Court did not dispute the Panel’s right to either decide or to hear an appeal. For what it is worth I personally believe that it was the Court of Session who acted ultra vires, not the Judicial Panel.
Arty on 31 May, 2012 at 18:22 said
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Arty thank you for your reply my friend . No doubt football is a wonderful game . even better when it is played .FAIRLY . a term we celtic fans have not seen in this country for a long time . In my post i mentioned a scenario .i would like to see ( but dont expect to ) that being our club play its football outwith this little country , where we might just get a fair crack of the whip and be allowed to compete without one hand tied behind our backs .
jimtim.