Thinker

It is a pretty sad state of affairs. I wonder if there's any other country in the world where the champions fly the flag of a foreign nation.

Some of those proposed mergers would result in a blood-bath. The best way is to divide income from sponsorship/TV/whatever between the top however-many-teams-you-want-to-survive and let attrition run it's course. You're bang on about the disproportionality of the votes though. The average home gate of Rangers last season was more than the combined total for the whole SFL. We should be voting them in! That's actually the most astonishing point about how destructive this debacle has become. 25% of bums on seats in the SPL are due to Rangers. It's still >20% if you take into account the whole of Scottish football. Probablly a similar proportion of the population of the country are Rangers fans - well over 1 million. And yet Scottish football wants to disenfranchise all of us!? Are we all to be denied seeing our club compete because a couple of dodgy characters messed with the taxman? Are we all bad guys just because an unwelcome element of neds and biggots have latched themselves onto our club? Are 20% of the population of Scotland scum who deserve to be kicked out of football?

That's what I like about the statement. It professes regret over a situation that the SFA and SPL are largely culpable for. It simultatneously ticks the box for contrition while pointing out what the problem was. CW and (as you say) by extension, the SFA's system that allowed him to do what he did.

We specifically didn't do anything wrong. But CW ran the club like a fecking maniac for a year. This apology isn't about EBTs; it isn't about us being sorry that the rest all have to live in our shadow. All the statement says is, "Sorry that guy who bought us was a nutter."

The buses in Glasgow aren't green - they're white with a purlple stripe.

It's not quite as simple as that unfortunately. There's a whole heap of history you can plough through if you have the time. Read up about the grief the Welsh teams in England had to go through when the League of Wales was formed, and also Wimbledon's attempt to relocate to Dublin. The SFA would have a say in things and the FA have to treat other associations with respect.

I have no problem at all with that statement. He's laid the blame squarely at the feet of the perpetrators.

Green (or whoever had happened to be in charge for that matter) will vote for the most financially acceptable solution - and so should all the other chairmen if they're doing their job properly. The only consideration to "sporting integrity" will be to project what the effect of supporter boycotts (reduced income from ticket sales) due to Rangers reminaing in the SPL or going to Div1 would be. Us going into Div3 may well wreck the top-flight of Scottish football. But we're going to be back playing there in a few years, so a scorched earth policy is not a wise long-term option.

Slightly away from the point of the topic, but I really don't like this analogy as it equates Rangers to a sunken ship. We're still afloat! We just got bought by another shipping company Seriously though, you have to be careful with metaphors like this as it's the kind of thing our detractors pounce on!

Finally a voice of reason?

We can apply for the 3rd but we can't demand entry. It'll go to a vote from the other clubs and we need to get 75%.

We are currently without a league to play in. We're in no position to make demands.

Again, I agree. But I think this is also subject to a vote, which I find worrying.

So would I, but we might not get the opportunity. Entry into Div3 is not a guaranteed fallback for us. It'll go down to a vote, and there are a lot of bitter bastards out there holding black balls.

It's crap that our players are walking for free but that's not Rapid Vienna etc's fault.

Well, I think a lot of these clubs will go into admin, but unless they're unfortunate enough to owe the tax man the majority of the money, they'll probably manage to CVA their way out with only a points penalty. We should be prepared to buy up the first one that goes into admin. I'll feel no guilt about destroying any of the SPL teams to get Rangers back into the top flight. I'm going to guess St. Mirren will be first.

That statement reminds me of Mikhailichenko? He was ridiculously lazy, but I still liked him... There's no logic to the like/dislike thing sometimes.

But that would set a precedent - any club could run up a massive debt, liquidate, newco, and then motor on debt free.

Too true. The vote ought to be weighted by support. Especially bearing in mind that our average home gate is greater than that of the whole SFL combined. I'm convinced that if our continued league membership in any division comes down to a vote then we're going to lose. I think we're going to have to buy our way back in - by snapping up the first club that goes into admin and merging it with ours.

This guy is an idiot. Many clubs have gone into administration, paid pence in the pound to continue, and recieved only a points penalty. Also, Rangers are not being punished for anything that has happened over the "last number of years". That's still under investigation.

If we want to keep hold of the good parts of our history, then we have to deal with some of the mess too. I actually want us to settle our footballing debts. It's not reasonable to think we can just write off all the debt that CW ran up and start over without any other consequences - otherwise every club would do it over and over again.

The problem, as I see it, is that we are in an incredibly weak position to negotiate from. Even if we apply straight to Div3, there are still many ways that the SFA can hurt us. They could "officially" deny us our history, they could force a change of club name, they could strip titles, and worst of all, they could deny us re-entry.

"Could be"... If, I assume, it's proven that there were dual contracts. I used to be confident that these allegations would turn out to be garbage, but I've long since ceased to believe DM wouldn't be that reckless.

There is a real danger that, as things stand, we could voted out of the entire Scottish football set up. If the offer of benefits for Div1 clubs is enough to swing it so that we definitely have a league to play in next season then I will be extremely relieved! Think about it: Back in the SPL for the 2013-14 season, challanging for the title the one after. That statement may be optimisitc, but it's not unrealistic. It may well ease the pain for the other SPL clubs, but if that means we get back to some semblance of normality sooner, then I'm all for it.

The only way this is going to work is if there's no vote. It's good for the Div1 clubs, but is it good enough to overcome their bloody-mindedness? Any other club not directly benefiting will bow to the mob mentality of the fans, I fear.