Swello

But there must be a point when you attach so many conditions to protect yourself (Ibrox and MP owned by the club, no fallout from Ticketus, no liability for tax, playing squad still in place, club stays in SPL, etc, etc) that you get to the stage where it becomes a fairly pointless PR exerc.....ahhhh

I don't see how anyone can make an offer when it can't be clear what they are buying in terms of assets and liabilities...

Who knows - but it's nice to see the Rangers fans mindlessly lashing out at something else and giving their womenfolk a break.

But they've had 3 weeks to do the punting - why are still talking about it?

Very strange posture given that he was using the 4 OF games as a major argument against an expanded SPL just a few months back with the jist being that less OF games = smaller TV deal.

Not based on any facts - but my gut feeling is that if UEFA really started to look under the rocks to see the mechanisms that their member clubs have used to pay players over the years, they would have to hammer some far bigger names than Rangers....

This snash deserves it's own thread really.... My instant reaction to the idea to limit the punishment to "european" clubs is that it is entirely illogical. Look at Motherwell, Dundee and Livi - they all went into admin after over-spending in chasing 3rd place. Surely, these would be exactly the type of "financial doping" offences that deserve to be punished - ie - where a club rises above it's peer group by unsustainable spending? It is also completely possible that a club can reach the SPL by overspending in the 1st Division in a speculative way in the hope that SPL membership will pay off the "credit card" and then get into financial trouble. As far as I'm concerned, these "crimes" are equal and should be punished identically.

Since 'Well were in the grubber 10 years ago - I've taken an interest in the way other administrations have gone up here and south of the border - and the pace of action from the administrators in this case just seems completely out of step with every other one. Given that they are hemorrhaging cash in a pretty spectacular way, I can't get my head round the fact that there hasn't been far more decisive action in terms of cutbacks to staff and other "obvious" outgoings. The administrators seem to be running Rangers in a "steady state" the way we saw Bryan Jackson do at Motherwell after the big cuts had been made - when I would be expecting things to be cut to the bare bones.

I think they are going to use the more scientific "Good guy, Good guy, w**k" method. Kyle Lafferty should be very afraid.

Because of the worry?

Again - I like the sentiments and I want these things to happen - but the "death" of Rangers which you're basing this on is just misty eyed fantasy and nothing more. Do you honestly think that an entity called "Rangers" won't be about after this?

On Hearts - they are struggling badly financially and I can't see Romanov (even given his erratic history) cutting of his nose to spite his face to make a point, regardless of how satisfying it would be. On Celtic, I just find the idea of a PLC voluntarily making their trading environment markedly worse a bit far fetched. Better for them to have a badly wounded Rangers in the league, still piss all over them, qualify for the CL and retain season ticket levels, sponsorship and TV revenue, all of which would suffer without the other cheek. I would have thought that their fans would enjoy the boasting rights of pumping rangers 4 times a season for a few years rather than never playing them, but who knows....

I know it's great fun for us all to make big pronouncements like the above - but it's utterly naive to think that the SPL chairmen would willingly chuck Rangers out and lower their income where there is an option to keep them - it won't happen. The discussion about which clubs can ride it out is also an irrelevance - just because St Johnstone could for example, it doesn't mean that they would do it by choice. And the vain hope that Hearts or even more bizarrely, Celtic would do this is fucking laughable given that they probably have the most to lose for differing reasons.

Not just that, the textile industry will take a huge hit were the demand for oversize Union flags with <distant town> Loyal embroidered on them, to drop off significantly - and the cottage industry of producing cassette tapes of badly recorded Orange Music-to-be-sold-from-a-wee-tray-outside-Ibrox will be in turmoil.....

No - there'll just be an Orange Walk every Saturday to take up the slack.

Has anyone reported this to Watchdog yet? They'll find the truth and we'd see Whyte getting doorstepped

By "stepped back", he means "in hiding, in fear of a chibbing"

I tend to agree - I can see a drop in demand for Season Tickets as the cost would no longer seem so attractive without the OF games and we normally see a big dip for Celtic's "non-season" ticket games in the cup and europa League. They would still have crowds that the rest of us could only dream of - but I can't see the Waiting List being dusted off any time soon....

you're both wrong - it's the other guy

To be fair - you often get questions in FMQ's each week asking Salmond to comment on (often quite small) businesses going into admin under dodgy circumstances - and he gives a fairly stock response that isn't a million miles from his line on Rangers. The bottom line is that politicians are powerless over this stuff but need to generate some soundbites - and when you add a Scottish media that can work an OF angle into any story - then it was inevitable that the PM and FM were asked about it.

The difference being that most non-OF sides would be in big trouble starting the season on -15. Do that now and everyone from 6th place down would be bottom of the league. For Rangers, it's only meaningful as it would hand the title to Celtic for a few years but it wouldn't threaten their status.

Not holding my breath but if the non-OF chairmen had any sort of political nous, they would use this situation to remove the absurd voting rules that give the OF a veto on the important stuff. It's always been a ridiculous setup but in light of the current farce, it looks completely indefensible.

I don't usually like his stuff - but the point on the relationship between the OF and the press at the end is good. The Scottish sports press have come out of this looking every inch the supine, incompetent rabble that most people already think they are. Even on the rare occasions that they have attempted to take a mildly critical line against Rangers, they have been hopelessly out of their depth - and they are still playing catchup now. Stick to printing transfer speculation for your favourite agents and asking sooky questions to Coisty lads....

Of those - it's a cast iron certainty that Neil Doncaster, Celtic & Motherwell will vote for Rangers being admitted. I would assume that a threat to the TV deal would also push St Johnstone over the edge as despite the fact that they are a superbly run club with no debt - they must rely disproportionately on TV money to balance the books given their attendances. No Idea about Utd - but they carry a lot of debt AFAIK and so they would also be likely at least. In other words - an utter shoe-in if it is voted for in that forum.

Very interesting if true. I suppose as much as Whyte has known all along that he would take them into Admin, HMRC must have seen that coming also - so I would imagine that there would be some planning around it already. Despite being a Motherwell fan, I'm not an Admin expert and my question is - is this move by HMRC to stop Craig Whyte appointing a "tame" administrator in a bid to retain control over what happens going forward?