Leaderboard

Thought I'd update you with some stats from our forum MotM votes so far this season. Enjoy! Votes Cast (at time of image creation): 513 Games Played (including Leverkusen 2nd Leg): 22 Number of Different MotM Winners: 10 Current Leader: James Tavernier (5 awards / 19.5% of the total votes cast)

'One Game at a Time' - a hackneyed old phrase or a necessary strategy going forward? Starting this Thursday, the 26th November we play Benfica at Ibrox in a Europa Group stage match. Ending on the 30th December, we play St Mirren away in our last Premiership game of the year. It's a total of eleven games in thirty-four days. Do the arithmetic, that's one match every three days. We have a large squad, we are playing extremely well, and our mental approach appears to have improved. This run of matches will be a real test, knocks, strains, and injuries will kick in. Suspensions, refereeing decisions, and the fickle finger of Covid all await. Let's break it down, six league games, two at home, four away. Three Europa Cup fixtures, two at home, one away. Hopefully, two League Cup ties, one definitely away on plastic, and another(probably Livi' away), a quarter-final midweek on the 15-17th December. The six League matches are : Ross County and Dundee United, both away, followed by Motherwell at home. St Johnstone and St Mirren are also away, with Hibs at home squeezed in between. After Benfica, we have Standard Liege at Ibrox finishing against Poznan in Poland a week later. Inevitably, Rangers supporters will want to compare and contrast with our separated brethren's fixture list. I think we must desist. We must set out our plan, and adhere to it. All members of the squad should be informed they have a significant part to play. This includes players who are receiving little or no game time recently. I don't think prioritising competitions will work either. Gerrard must win silverware, we must progress in the League Cup. Our finances demand further advances in Europe. The League speaks for itself. I am tempted to ensure Europa Cup qualification occurs as soon as possible, certainly by the end of the next two games, both at Ibrox. The League Cup tie at Grangemouth on plastic should see a few changes. Falkirk are a club two divisions below and we have a record of serious injury on such a surface. On current form, all the league fixtures are comfortably winnable, but the merest hint of a wrong attitude, two or three of them could degenerate into battles. Gerrard and McAllister's ability to micro-manage will be tested. The games are coming thick and fast, the reward at the conclusion will be a visit to Ibrox from ra green'n'grey hooped horrors on the 2nd January. Will Neil still be manager? Let's take it one game at a time.

I actually hope not. ? I think we've suited having no fans.

Joe Black @joe_black1509 Dave King Rangers AGM Dec 2019 ''The South African authority would not approve a further investment in shares in Rangers and eventually only approved a loan on an interest earning basis.

I hope we keep this current confidence handy because the chance of going through an entire season without a wobble is somewhere between slim and none at all. I just hope we can control the usual instant panic when we stumble.

The team does better without us. Keep us out.

20% of FTSE 100 companies have a CEO who is an accountant, so quite a few are in the driving seat.

As was rightly said on the weekly blog after horsing the Dons, we need to keep the foot on their neck. We play another league game when they play the cup final, we beat Motherwell , and we could potentially be 17 points clear. If TLB is still in charge then, he'll be throwing the players into the fires of Mordor again, and Declan will be in the car park. They keep going on about us faltering, when they know fine well they are more likely to stutter. They are shiteing themselves, and quite rightly so. Bring it on.

It's Predestination. O Thou that in the Heavens does dwell! Wha, as it pleases best thysel, Sends ane to Heaven, ten to telly, A’ for Thy glory! And no for ony gude or ill They’ve done before Thee.—

Get the title changed to “Player of the Match” I noticed that in the rugby at the weekend. No doubt concern that one of the forty or so thugs on the park might not have been a man.

One game at a time. It's a cliche but it has its merits.

https://www.gersnet.co.uk/index.php/news-category/current-affairs/1257-review-of-the-rangers-accounts-2020 Overview The release of the annual accounts on a Friday evening wasn’t a good sign. I was concerned when I downloaded them and they were worse than I had expected, showing a headline loss before tax of £17.8m but is it as bad as it seems? Yes and no. · No, the loss is funded by the directors/investors who have converted most of their loans into share capital. · No, we could have sold players to eliminate the loss if we so desired. We didn’t, unlike other clubs, and we are selling the benefit of that on the pitch. · Yes, losses of this level are not sustainable and the financing from the directors/investors will not continue indefinitely which make the require for Champions’ League football and/or regularly selling players for multi-million pound profits a requirement. What is the loss? Those who read my review last year may remember that we need to ignore notional interest that is included in the accounts as it is only there for accounting purposes and will never actually be paid. The loss before tax of £17.8m can therefore be reduced by £1.9m and is actually £15.9m compared to last year’s loss of £8.7m, an increase of £7.2m Why the increase in the loss? · An increase in staff costs of £8.9m · A decrease in the profit of sale of players of £2.4m · Increased amortisation of the purchase price of players of £1.2m (Kent and Helander) · Partly offset by an increase in revenue of £5.8m Revenue Revenue increased from £53.2m to £59.0m (+£5.8m), mainly due to our European run. We generated £20.7m which is up £6.4m from the prior year which again highlights how important a run in Europe is to us. Gate receipts and Hospitality rose 11.6% to £35.7m, despite the Covid-19 impact of playing 5 league games with no crowd and a small proportion of season ticket holders requesting a refund for the missed games. Staff costs Staff costs increased by 26% in the year, going from £34m to £43m, which was a result of bringing Gerrard to the club and a significant increase in the quality of the squad. A 79 % increase over the last 2 years sounds bad but the following should be taken into account: · Staff costs as a percentage of revenue at 73.4% is around the same level as it was 2 years ago. · The average for the English Championship, for last season was 107% and was 94% and 78% for League 1 and League 2 in the prior year, so it shows that the level we have it is reasonable, albeit based on European income, which isn’t guaranteed · Celtic’s staff costs are 25% higher than ours. Other operating expenses Other Operating Expenses (including matchday costs and the costs of maintaining the stadium and RTC) increased from £22m to £23.2m. This is disappointing considering we played 3 less homes games and the previous year’s figure was looked upon as being high due to the additional legal and professional fees of £3.6m, due mainly to the ongoing Sports Direct dispute. We are not told what this year’s legal fees were, but they may have continued to be high, to allow us to sign the Castore deal. Reducing Other Operating Expenses may impact the matchday experience for us so there’s a fine line in keeping costs under control and satisfying the fans, but it is an area where they need to keep a careful watch. Purchase of players Rangers spent £11m on players during the year. This would have mainly been on Kent and Helander. Given the sums involved, it appears that the purchase of Hagi was didn’t go through in this year’s accounts, despite reports to the contrary. This also does not include the purchases of Itten and Roofe, which happened after the year-end. Sale of players We made a £0.7m profit on the sale of players, compared to £3.1m in the previous year. I assume that Candeias would make up a majority of this year’s profit. However we need to be able to be making millions each year to sustain a break-even situation in the future. Our model looks to be largely working as we could have sold Morelos for a sum that would have allowed us to break-even, and going forward we may not be able to have the luxury to turn down 8-figure bids. Retail Retail income was £3.3m for the year which is the same as last year. However it appears that a majority of this has not been received as there is £2.3m outstanding and the club have commenced legal proceedings to recover it. The Castore deal does not start until this season and therefore is not reflected in these accounts, and hopefully that will show an area of increase. Although we are free of Sports Direct and have successfully negotiated a retail deal away from Ashley, it is disappointing to see the legal case is still ongoing and we may have to pay further money to SDI. Cash Cash has increased from £1m to £11m but I presume that this is due to the timing of the receipt of directors’ loans. We have £14.9m of debtors which is season ticket cash which is in respect of season tickets that are paid by supporters using deferred payment plans or credit cards so that will be converted into cash. The credit card companies are passing on the cash over the course of a season to limit their risk. This isn’t an issue as it’s only a short term cashflow problem and it hasn’t prevented us from spending £15m on players after the financial year-end. Funding Director and shareholder loans outstanding last year were £11.2m, an additional net £21.8m was provided during the year and £17.7m were converted into shares, leaving £15.3m outstanding at the year end. Since the year end an additional £4.5m has been provided and another incredible £13.3m converted into shares, highlighting the incredible commitment of the directors and other investors, leaving £6.5m currently outstanding, £5m of which is due to Dave King (see below) and £1.5m due to John Bennett. There is another £2.9m of loans outstanding to a third party, possibly from Close Leasing, which is presumably short-term funding being repaid once the credit card companies release the season ticket cash. A further £8.8m will be needed for this season and £14.4m for next season and Douglas Park and John Bennet have agreed to provide loan facilities to cover these amounts, which are obviously subject to player trading and how we do in Europe. Dave King funding Dave King has provided £16m of funding to the club since he came back in 2015. £11m has been converted into shares and £5m remains outstanding and is due to be repaid to him next year. It is slightly disappointing that he is charging interest at 8% on the remaining £5m, an annual charge of £400K. However, given everything he has done for the club and the level of funding he has provided in the last 5 years and also when Murray was in charge, it seems churlish to criticise him too much. There may also be tax reasons why interest had to be charged. Given that interest is being charged, there is a repayment date stated and he did not make the opportunity to convert the loans during the last couple of share issues, it appears that he will be looking for repayment of the £5m, and that it was always the intention for this loan to be part of a short-term funding exercise for it not to be converted into shares. Improvements There was £2.1m of fixed asset expenditure, presumably work done on Ibrox and RTC. This highlights that the directors are continuing to invest significantly in the club’s infrastructure (£8.6m over the past 3 years) as well as the playing squad. Sundry The club made a claim on its Business Interruption insurance for losses caused by Covid-19 and has received £1.25m, which is excellent as many insurance companies have refused to pay, but it remains doubtful whether there will be any more forthcoming. Post year-end The club has continued its spending after the year-end with £15.4m being incurred on players including the signing of Itten and Roofe and presumably Hagi (it was reported that Hagi signed earlier but the amounts do not back this up) and they will appear in the 2021 accounts. However it should be remembered that the amounts spent will be written off over the length of their contracts. The £15.4m is far higher than I expected, even if it also includes the minimal fees for McLaughlin, Bassey and a loan fee for Zungu, and it will result in another increase in amortisation charges in next year’s accounts. The future The losses over the last few years, including the one shown in this year’s accounts, are not a concern as they have been fully funded by our directors/investors and we should continue to be very grateful to them for that. However this level of funding cannot go on indefinitely. Despite the appearance of new investors (Alan McLeish, Danny McKinlay, Stuart Gibson, Neil Hosie), the well must be running dry soon. It appears that Dave King will be looking for his £5m loan to be repaid and it is unclear whether future loans from Park and Bennett will be real loans or converted to shares. Financially, it is vital that we win the league this season to give us a better chance of reaching the holy grail of the Champions League and we will need to make at least one big sale of a player. We do need to continue to get regular European group football and regularly make multi-million profits on player sales to allow us to break even and this is the business model that our directors have put in place. We know from bitter experience that we need to keep an eye on our financial position and my outlook is slightly more pessimistic than it was 12 months ago, but we looking good on the pitch and have a number of players where we could make large profits. Although the loss was large, it was fully funded and we’re one good player sale away from breaking even. We just need to keep a careful eye on the finances over the next couple of years.

Sunday Morning Coming Down. Kris Kristofferson's seminal lyric perfectly describes BBC Radio Scotland on a Sunday morning/afternoon, particularly when Rangers have a noon kick off at Ibrox. Kris tells the story of waking up in a small town, after the Saturday night gig, the night before. He needs a couple of beers to straighten out before donning his cleanest dirty shirt. Really, there's nothing short of dying, half as loansome as the sound of Jane Lewis attempting to stimulate some life into the Naughty Step Crew. Liam McLeod was joined by Billy("I no longer consider myself a Rangers supporter")Dodds and Richard Foster. Rangers home games ensures all the Naughty Step Crew can remain socially distanced and seated in a PQ studio, whilst watching SKY TV. I suspect Dandy Liam is not too happy because when SKY run a replay of Roofe being upended in the box, Liam has no room for manoeuvre? Apparently, Rangers were the beneficiaries of facing a Covid weakened Aberdeen, a couple of deflections, and a soft penalty award. Big Dick's "undiluted rage" appears to have disappeared like the dreams of yesterday. Dreary, drab, dreich, ......... are the emotions issued by the PQ QM. Monday evening saw the return of Tom English. There's a fire to be fought, Neil Lennon is under pressure. Kenny MacIntyre hosted, Craig Levein and Darryl Broadfoot added to the conversations. Broadfoot defended the SFA, Tom and Craig attacked the national association over their handling of the Under 21s and Covid. All three agreed Lennon remains the very man for ra Sellik job. Tom reminded the listenership of the fragility of Neil's mental health, lambasted Edouard, called two or three other Sellik forwards, "underachieving failures", and did the full symmetry by reminding the listenership of the fragility of Leigh Griffiths mental health. There was no insight into Gerrard and Rangers, Tom finds the whole Rangers thing frustrating. Craig Levein offered improved psychology on Gerrard's dealing with the media. He recalled Rangers winning at Tynecastle a couple of seasons past and Gerrard and backroom staff celebrating like the league had been won. This season, Gerrard's reactions are far more measured. We could hear a hurrumpf from Tom at this opinion and Craig showed he is a fast learner. Levein got after Kenny MacIntyre, "you'll be happy being a big Rangers man". Tom was guffawing. The demands of PQ are even getting to Craig. Still, it's good to know Tom can continue to laugh.

It takes time to gel?. I don't know if it is because we have been used to watching garbage since our admin? but this team is playing some of the best football I have seen a Rangers team play! am I wrong?.

It's not mutually exclusive...or are you claiming to know that all accountants think the same way?

I for one want to witness our silky football first hand and therefore cannae wait to get back to Ibrox albeit with a vastly reduced attendance.

Its after the new year break that concerns me we seem to find it hard just to slip into gear again .

The schedule won't be getting any easier but the more games the better as far as I'm concerned right now with so many players in good form. We've already coped quite well with some key players being unavailable so it's ideal to be hitting the busiest period of the season so far with a full squad (barring Katic, Jones and Edmundson for now).

Brilliant work thanks.

Delighted for Tavernier , but this squad just need to be enjoyed because we wont have a lot of these guys soon .

The chat I heard/read suggested it would be done on a geographical basis (ie. supporters who live closest to Ibrox would be given priority). I agree though, I don't see what difference 4k would make inside Ibrox. The groans might be more specific. I doubt I'll be at Ibrox at all this season.

Now online: https://www.gersnet.co.uk/index.php/news-category/current-affairs/1257-review-of-the-rangers-accounts-2020

I get nervous when we start to focus too much on them. We're in a strong position and it matters very little what they do, if we win all our games from here until season end, we are champions. If we win everything but the OF fixtures, they need a minimum of 7 points from those three games or we are champions. That needs to be the focus, ignore them. If they drop more points great but as long as we don't then we are champions. We've seen leads disappear quickly before and I suspect part of that is by focusing on the lead not the upcoming game...

Yes. He took too many risks -- or, at least a couple. As I said in the match thread, it's completely unnecessary; his normal game is more than adequate.

That lot changing manager might see them improve or might see them get worse. Who knows. What we need to do is keep playing well, keep our feet on the ground and make sure we stay on top.

Also this is a decent watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4L

What's refereeing coming to when red cards are brandished at a footballing superstar like Josh Windass? A toss up between corruption and incompetence.

Mistaken Identity, one might assume, but, really, is that likely with the God like figure of Josh? He fought the battle of Jericho, you know

Thanks Bluedell, a very helpful summary. We really are incredibly fortunate to have the directors we currently have, I'm not sure supporters fully appreciate what they're doing just now. As you say we'll need to start selling good players quite soon, if not January certainly in May. Our wages to turnover ratio feels high at slightly over 73%, but then I guess that's why we made a loss. Celtic's is sitting at around 80% I understand so these things are all relative. Anyway, thanks BD and thanks Mr King, Park and Bennett.

Great team performance all round, Arfield was outstanding, however Tav has been fantastic this season and in the EL and he is leading the team with his performances, goals & assists so for that reason I am going with Tav.