Thinker

http://itsgrammartime.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/focussed-vs-focused.html

It seemed more-or-less on time to me. Before 19:50 anyway.

I don't think this is to do with meeting in the Euros. Unlike the current situation in Scotland, the English Premiership is still a separate organisation from the and lower divisions (the Football League) and the two have differing rules on dual ownership. IIRC the FL's rules are more restrictive, and potentially better for us WRT getting rid of unwanted influences.

What!!!? I think the difference in quality between us and Motherwell has always been considerably more than anything an EBT could account for.

I still don't think that's 100% correct. The way we administered it was not illegal either - it simply failed (according to the latest ruling) to reduce the tax bill.

As far as I can see, the legality of the EBT scheme is beyond question. The court case is simply to decide whether our players' EBTs were administered in a way which successfully avoided tax. If not, oldco owe HMRC a wad of cash (which is how it stands unless there's a successful appeal). It's not illegal for a company to inadvertently incur a bill it can't pay. It's usually down to incompetence or in this case (as t4c rightly says) recklessness.

Well put. The other point is that, even if we ultimately win the appeal, we've already suffered the consequences for not being able to pay that tax bill. i.e. insolvency, resulting in sporting sanctions, resulting in demotion. And assuming HMRC win, where's the difference from any other club that spent money they couldn't afford chasing success, and came a financial cropper?

Just been listening to it. Wilson's points are solid. The appropriate action for contractual non-disclosure has already been taken by the SFA based on Nimmo-Smith's enquiry and can't be revisited. The appropriate action for the (subject to appeal) non-payment of tax on the EBTs is that HMRC issue a bill to oldco. There is no question of cheating or illegality, and no grounds for title stripping.

Whether we're ultimately found guilty or not we already have paid the consequences - we got hit with a massive bill from HMRC that bankrupted us. As many have pointed out, we could have fielded the same line-ups simply by borrowing more money and building up a debt. The financial consequences for the club would have been virtually the same. The only major difference would have been we'd probably have been able to negotiate some affordable scheme of pay-back or a CVA with a lender. Look around the world of football - it's not that uncommon for clubs to ruin themselves by overspending. The consequences are clear. The years of success are balanced by the years in the wilderness. We have suffered those consequences and more - and we may yet be told we didn't actually owe what HMRC claimed at all.

I think, the point Burchill's trying to make is that the media stink is especially bad for Gibbons since he's likely to play his entire career in Scotland and has therefore shat on his own doorstep... therefore the press should go a bit easier on him(?!). It's still a ridiculously weak argument though. My advice to Gibbons would be: If you don't want a hard time, don't commit horrible cynical fouls. Even if your manager encourages you to do it pre-match.

That's brilliant!

Really well written - but for me the term "vertical football" immediately conjures images of skyrocket punts and head tennis. I suppose the technically accurate term for direct, downfield play would be longitudinal football, but that's about as far from catchy as you can get, so I'll shut up.

I think most people recognise that change is required, but I don't think an even split of "prize" money is the way to go (if that's what you're suggesting). There has to be some incentive to move up the rungs of the league table as the season progresses otherwise you end up with a ton of pointless, dead rubber matches at the end of the season. Outside of the European qulification / promotion and relegation spots, there has to be something left to aim for in the last couple of months, and the best way to do this is for the prize money to increase as a club climbs the table. The "mid-table dead zone" would be even more of an issue if (as has been suggested) we moved to an expanded 16 team top tier - there would be no effective difference between finishing 5th and finishing 13th. That's not exciting or competetive. The best work-around for this is probably the Belgian top flight which ends the season with an elaborate split and play-off system to decide Champions League, Europa League and relegation spots - but it is horribly contrived and IMHO pretty unsatisfactory. My own personal preference (an idea which takes a hell of lot of explaining) would be for the smaller nations of Europe to form NFL style conferences. For example, a top flight of six clubs (or eight or whatever number is deemed most workable) from Scotland play each other twice, and play enough additional identical fixtures against teams from a couple of other national conferences (which would differ each season) to make a decent length of season. European qualification and relegation spots make up a high proportion of the 6 places in the conference - there's as good a chance as you can get of there being something to play for right until the end of the season. There would also be greater interest in matches (and therefore more sponsorship opportunity) as the games would draw viewers from more than one nation. If you make the prize money for the second tier champions in each nation enough that they have a fighting chance of staying up, you've got an interesing and exciting competition year on year. I admit that it's mnost probably too radical a suggestion to ever be taken seriously, but I genuinely believe it could be workable.

I agree. We have to accept that the SPFL are operating on a different order of magnitude from the NFL (not that anyone other than Gordon Wadell would seriously attempt to compare figures without acknowledging that blatantly obvious fact).

Not to mention that the NFL has 32 clubs for a nation of 321.5 million whereas the SPFL has 42 clubs for a nation of 5.5 million. I'm fairly sure that's a pretty important contributing factor when it comes to their superior attendance figures and sponsorship deal values. There are also less games in a season. Do I envy NFL supporters who have to pay an arm and a leg to see even a single game live? Not really.

Their team made an apology of an attempt to give us a game us on Saturday (albeit a poor one). Does that count?

Was there a Match of the Day on on Saturday? I don't think there was...

St Mirren will probably feel he owes them a couple of years after his spell on the sidelines.

Aye. But you could say that about a lot of clubs. Hibs, for example.

I also love how he turns Oduwa-gate into a positive - i.e. it's good for the lad's development as he's learning how to deal with idiots in the press, and he'll be a better professional for it. That must really piss the hacks off.

If that's the most critical story they can dig up on Warburton, then he's doing well. As is usually the way, the headline is far more sensational than the actual quote. Plus the whole thing is mitigated by Brentford's cup humiliation - they certainly don't seem to be better off without him...

It looked like a big RFC to me - with a horizontal stripy background that made it hard to read.

I think most people would agree with a lot of what you're saying, but there is a bit more to it. What's being published about is us is not illegal - no slander or libel laws have been broken as far as I can see. But there is no doubt in my mind that there is a bias to their reporting - and surely it's reasonable to expect the BBC to treat all its mandatory customers even-handedly? Reports on incidents involving certain other clubs are nicely air-brushed; played down or hidden away. Reports on anything negative surrounding us however get a "warts and all" approach. To me, the story after the Hibs game just smacks of McLaughlin scrabbling for something bad to write about us to take the shine off a really good result. Am I being paranoid for thinking that? Assuming it's not just me, how can you build a bridge with an organistaion like that? There's no cosying up to them and sadly, writing anti-rangers articles seems to be a sound strategy for any unscrupulous journalist to adopt. Whatever you lose in Rangers fans, you more than gain back in OCD haters. I don't think the ban will stop the bias, but at least it lets the world know that we see these reporters as being biased.

I don't know why the SFA okayed him to own 10% in the first place. What did they think he wanted to own a chunk of Rangers for, if not to exert an influence?

He does a bit! Something about his forehead/eyebrow area puts me in mind of Terry Butcher too.