UCF2008

Green needs to stop opening his mouth and letting his belly rumble. In that statement he not only makes himself look foolish by naming a supporter to our cause only to have them immediately shoot down the notion, but has also managed to cause offense to other clubs including Villa yet again. I don't want to give Liewell any credit but if you compare the statements from the two chief execs on the subject it's embarassingly obvious which one has the better debating and no doubt negotiating skills.

If you look back to before Whyte took over, where we had so many of Rangers dealings with HMRC being leaked to the press and photographers laying in wait every time the taxman visited Ibrox due to tip-offs. Even SDM accused HMRC of treating Rangers differently from other businesses and questioned these leaks. Do I think that HMRC have an agenda against Rangers? As a whole, no. To think that would be paranoid. However I do believe that an element exists within their ranks which was determined to destroy Rangers when given half a chance.

away strips link at the top of the page mate ...or click here

Having been giving a valuation of the property assets at £80m he values the club at £25m and argues that it's a 'low' valuation. Comparing the insurance valuation vs sale value of those properties to that of a house is a stretch to say the least, but all the same are you suggesting £25m isn't low enough?

I agree with retail being run by pofessional retailers. I'm wondering how this compares to the JJB deal. We apparently have more freedom under the new deal. More freedom to do exactly as you're suggesting would lose us money. Under the new deal a new company has been formed by the club and sportsdirect to run the megastore with 'most' of those profits going back into the club. The club as far as I'm aware doesn't get any further income from the deal. What about online sales? Since sportsdirect have plenty of experience with online sales. Why does the club have no online store at the moment? While JJB were considered a club business partner, why would it appear, at least from looking at the club website, that sportsdiect aren't?

You could well be right about Green playing games with the bidders. It's not the kind of way I like to see our club doing business mind you. To be fair and to hopefully get back on the intended topic. The shirt deal isn't the issue. I'm not too worried about it. Like you say it's expected to take time. It's also not losing the club money right now as we speak. The sportsdirect deal is what I'm questioning. Does everyone here think it's looking like a good deal for the club so far? Am I missing something or is the only money from club merchandise being brought back into club coming via the megastore?

At the same time though, it could well be that everything's in order and Ashley's involvement is limited, for the time being ay least, to keeping the megastore running with the rest open to negotiation. What I would say though is that I'd be very surprised if we've been told the truth about these developments.

It could possibly be that our new in-house website isn't up to speed, but it does look suspicious when they've found the time to remove JJB as an official club partner and sportsdirect.com who were their immediate and much trumpeted replacement don't get a mention.

I'm not really interested in debating who would be the best choice as our shirt manufacturer. The reason I mentioned the shirt deal was to question if it's even the club who will negotiate and have the final say on that or any merchandising decisions. Green made it look like ripping up the JJB deal was his choice and that he'd found us a better option. It's starting to look as though that may not have been the case at all. I would say it's within reason to speculate that his hand was forced by JJB's plumet to administration and with our merchandising deal up in the air he hastily negotiated a new deal with JJB's prospective buyer to ensure the continued operation of the Megastore. How the deal pans out beyond that is anyone's guess.

Made the players look like they were sweating buckets and fell apart at the seams a little too easily iirc.

Absolutely, but it's starting to look like that necessity may have forced us into cutting a new deal with Ashley as he prepared to take over JJB. So far, I don't see any evidence that our control of merchandising has strengthened as a result other than more moonbeams. Don't get me wrong, I understand that any radical change would take time to come to fruition. On Thursday Green stated “As Brian Stockbridge has got tighter controls, we’ve got a team in place and Imran Ahmad has begun working on the commercial side, things have changed as Rangers have rebuilt.” ...Our 4 man board are still trying to delegate responsibilities. Looks like it's definitely going to take time.

I just don't see any improvement over the JJB deal so far. We don't seem to have any more control over our merchandising than before. Maybe it's just taking time to setup the new infrastructure, but even if that's the case our return on merchandise for at least this season is suffering as a result. I wouldn't be surprised if the Megastore performs better than usual, but can it be enough to cover the loss of the JJB money? I doubt it. Have we got raw deal here and trumpeted it as a success. Time will tell I guess.

Adidas would be my preferred choice, but tbh I wouldn't be too dissappointed with Puma. The point is, who's running the show? Where does this leave the fans who want or have no option but to buy online? How much potential investment is the club currently missing out on in that regard?

First we've got Mike Ashley about to invest, which then develops into us ripping up the JJB deal and jumping into bed with sportsdirect.com who within a month were into the advanced stages of taking over JJB. Meanwhile we've got Green telling us that we're close to signing a new shirt deal with Adidas. The last update on that one afaik was that talks are ongoing and it's between Adidas and Puma. Funny how this coincides with said JJB takeover stalling over an ongoing row between Ashley and Adidas since he swapped Newcastles strip from Adidas to rivals Puma. The Rangers website currently lists no official merchandise partner and in fact doesn't even offer a link to purchase merchandise (beyond books, memorabilia etc.) online. We've got the club releasing strips and advising fans to buy direct from the club. That might be OK for locals, but what about the other 499 million?

Well apparently it's important enough to you... I really don't see the reason to be so offended by a colour, especially if choosing that colour for a 2nd or 3rd kit makes good business sense.

Well, while my opinion of McCoist as a manager might not be quite the polar opposite of the majority of the negativity thriving on this thread, I do generally rate him as a manager. I think he performed as well in his duties as could have been possible for any manager in his position last season. Far better than expected and it mystifies me how some of those fans could have been watching the same games as me. He's given youth a chance even when it's not been necessary. Was his arm being twisted to give the likes of McCabe as much game time last season? Tactically I think he's tried to be more attacking than Walter did, despite having less resources to do so. I've rarely disagreed with his team selections or been screaming at him to make a change. To put it simply, I don't see what all the fuss is about.

Personally, I have nothing but footballing reasons for defending Ally's position. I think it's worrying that anyone would have any other motivation to do so.

That's because I responded out of annoyance. I'll admit that and I can see that some on the other side of the debate have only been doing likewise. I know I would. My point was that Ally would put the club first, so you won't get any argument from me on that one.

That is absolutely not what I'm saying and as much as the end of my last post may have read like a personal jibe at your good self, it wasn't. What I would say is that everyone IS entitled to their own opinion. I would hope that I've made my own stance clear, but at the same time, I won't be losing any sleep over it if I haven't. I would like to think however that I'm not in the minority when I say that if Ally was to get the sack any time soon I'd be very angry about it and that the tide would quickly turn in this particular debate. Again, that's just my opinion.

Yes, it's his dream job, but only so long as he's keeping us headed in the right direction. I trust Ally completely to do what's best for Rangers. He most definitely will not give up without a fight, but he won't jeopardise the progress of the club if it's not working out. At this point in time, all we have is an over reaction from some fans who would have us change manager at the drop of a hat. It's the same sort of mob mentallity that put us in our current predicament. They'll never be satisfied. We're nowhere even near the point where I'd be defending Ally to the extent that I'd be using phrases like 'I expect him to turn it around' and yet we have almost a 100 page debate on whether he's the man to take us forward. Most of it makes for pretty sickening reading, but that's just my opinion. I'm not even interested in debating it further at this stage. I just hope your pal Green doesn't give in too easily in the meantime.

I still feel Ally is the right man for the job. I've seen nothing so far to convince me otherwise. Yes, I've been dissappointed in our performance in a few games, but I think that's to be expected as the team needs time to gell. Quite frankly I don't think a change of manager would make any difference at all at this stage. I think Ally needs to be given more time and deserves to be shown a lot more respect than he is by some fans. Ally will always put the club first and he's smart enough himself to know if and when someone could come in and do a better job than him.

I've got no problem with that at all mate. It's just that every time this type of hypothetical discussion is brought up it's met with derision. To be honest I think the best chance it has of happening is if it's organised by UEFA. Why not ditch the current format and have a proper Champions LEAGUE and European CUP?

If either side of the OF were invited to join the EPL, despite the result being a struggle to compete nevermind qualify for Europe, do you think they'd knock it back? The whole point should be to create a highly competitive league which allows the clubs involved an extended opportunity to realise their full potential. Why do we always have to be so dismissive and generally negative towards these type of discussions?

If it's a league which promises to be of similar stature to the EPL they'd be gone in a shot. Why choose a potential windfall over a guaranteed one?

It really depends. Some countries who've been keen on the idea in the past may be less interested now due to recent success in Europe or otherwise increased revenues. For it to really be a success it would need to have Holland and Portugal onboard at an early stage or else it would probably end up as a northern European league with the likes of us, the Irish pair and the Scandinavians. That WOULD struggle to take off. If the bigger better version happened any time soon I can see Scotland only getting one spot which would probably initially go to Celtic. The OF derby would be attractive but lets not kid ourselves on that Scotland would get 2 places in a European Super League.