Leggat - SPL Hatred Of Rangers Shows Again

[ian1964 10,625]

THE sheer intensity of the vicious vitriol being poured over St Mirren chairman Stewart Gilmour surely reveals the burning hatred of Rangers which infects the Scottish Premier League like a rampant plague.

 

The perception inside the SPL is that St Mirren were nobbled by Rangers. Or at least it looks that way. For surely there can be no other reason why Saints and Gilmour were singled out and not Roy McGregor of Ross County, who also voted against the daft 12-12-18 proposals.

 

Certainly that is the way Gilmour must see it, given the fact he has made it clear he will sue anyone who even hints at it.

 

And it would also seem that Celtic chief executive Peter Lawwell has a new attack dog to do his bidding and fight his public battles for him in the shape of the ludicrous Aberdeen owner Stewart Milne, whose talk of Gilmour having an agenda sparked the St Mirren chairman's legal threat.

 

Milneâ??s outburst and the language he used verged on the hysterical and was a total disgrace and Aberdeen fans may want to know why he has never seemed to show such aggression and passion when it comes to advancing the cause of their club, a club which has languished under his lack of leadership.

 

It looks to me as though Milne has now taken the place of Dundee Unitedâ??s arch Rangers hater of a chairman, Stephen Thompson, the man who led the attacks on Rangers last summer.

 

Incidentally, we never did learn why Thomson resigned from the SPL board and was then quietly ushered back on to that board. It was a shady deal, shrouded in mystery and suspicion, which pretty much summed up what kind of organisation the SPL is.

 

But back to the new alliance between Peter Lawwell and Stewart Milne. There were suspicions when the normally tongue tied Milne took to the media at the weekend to speak on behalf of the Celtic-driven reconstruction plans. Plans which fans right across the spectrum of Scottish football have already voted against.

 

Those suspicions were that Milne had been hand-picked by Peter Lawwell to be his public face. Though so desperate did Lawwell see the situation, he was finally forced out into the open and into to showing his own hand by summoning Sunday newspaper journalists to be briefed by him at Parkhead.

 

That looked like Aberdeen and Milne acting in tandem with Celtic and Lawwell.

 

But the full extent of the new Celtic-Aberdeen Axis was revealed when, on Monday, as their schemes faced defeat, both clubs tabled an amendment to the voting structure of the SPL which would have switched it to 9-3.

 

That was just another example of the SPL making it up as it goes along, another example of many of the myriad mysterious ways the SPL goes about its business. Integrity? The majority of SPL clubs give the clear impression they do not know the meaning of the word.

 

However St Mirrenâ??s Gilmour and that highly moral man, Roy McGregor of Ross County, were not to be bought off. Their anchor held.

 

Since Celtic and Lawwellâ??s scheming with Aberdeen and Milne has been exposed and since Gilmour and McGregor combined in the most decent, honourable and brave act Scottish football has seen for years, there has been a rush to rubbish them and brand Gilmour, in particular as a nasty, greedy man, with the unspoken accusation always lurking between the lines that he in cahoots with Rangers.

 

Milne and David Southern have been particularly vicious in what they have said. David Southern of course represents Hearts and the amount which could be written about moral integrity and Hearts since the club was taken over by Vladimir Romanov wouldnâ??t even fill the back of a postage stamp. Second class, of course.

 

Indeed, there may be many who believe that if the SPLâ??s £200,000-a-year chief executive Neil Doncaster had any integrity he would resign. Perhaps that is what Peter Lawwell feared and why he put out a statement from Celtic which gushed praise of Doncaster. All Lawwell succeeded in doing was making Doncaster look even more like Celticâ??s puppet.

 

And if it is Celtic who work Doncaster from behind then what Doncaster said shows that Peter Lawwell refuses to accept defeat. Heâ??s got another scheme up his sleeve.

 

We can take that much from Doncaster saying that he has no mandate from the SPL to talk about any plan B.....at the moment. So there is a plan B, but Peter Lawwell has not yet written Neil Doncasterâ??s script about it. Is that what's happening?

 

Doncaster then attempted to pass the buck to the honourable men of the Scottish Football League.

 

For Doncaster went on to say that the First Division clubs are consistently the biggest losers and that they need more income. Adding, letâ??s wait and see.

 

That should set alarm bells ringing in the SFL as it seems the SPL will now try to target the First Division clubs with a combination of bribes, blandishments and if neither work, bullying.

 

The words may come out of Stewart Milne and Neil Doncasterâ??s mouths. But there are many who believe the script has been written by Peter Lawwell.

[Scott7 5,667]

"Those suspicions were that Milne had been hand-picked by Peter Lawwell to be his public face."

 

Who in his right mind would pick Milne as his public face?