Club Statement On Play Off Tickets

[pete 2,499]

Mike Mulraney urges Rangers to rethink free play-off tickets

 

SPFL board member Mike Mulraney has urged clubs to reconsider plans to allow season ticket holders free entry to top-flight play-offs - and rediscover the togetherness that heralded the introduction of the season finale.

Sunday 03/05/2015

1 Comment

Print

 

The Alloa chairman - whose Scottish Championship club were consigned to a relegation play-off on Saturday - has been dismayed by recent proclamations from Motherwell and Rangers that they do not intend to charge season-ticket holders.

 

Hibernian went unpunished for the same decision last season but the SPFL believes those circumstances were unique and the Edinburgh club recently saw a bid to halve the levy on play-off income to 25 per cent heavily defeated.

 

The play-offs were seen as a means to create extra wealth needed to persuade top-flight clubs to open themselves up to another potential relegation place and smooth the way for the merger of two league bodies in June 2013. Hibs were given a £500,000 parachute payment last season and will be due £250,000 more if they do not go straight back up.

 

Mulraney told Press Association Sport: "The bottom line is we are supposed to be 42 clubs trying to work together and that's what I hope happens.

 

"A couple of clubs wanted to change the rules a week ago and it was voted down, and here we are with clubs saying they will either ignore the rules or try to subvert them by finding a way round them. It's disappointing.

 

"The big issue is what is right. Do you stand by the rule and also the spirit of the rule? Are we in it together or are we not?

 

"I believed we were when we were setting up the SPFL and I still believe it will be the case going forward.

 

"I don't want any clubs to back down - I want them to re-evaluate their position.

 

"If clubs believe the current set of rules are unfair then try to change them - don't break them or subvert them."

 

The SPFL board treated Hibs as a unique case because they had sold the bulk of their season tickets before the play-offs were in place, and Mulraney never thought the decision would be used by others as a precedent.

 

"It's easy to suggest it was a mistake and I understand why people think that but it was a unique set of circumstances," he said.

 

"It was still a very, very fine line but one of the issues was that Hibs sold these season tickets in good faith before the SPFL was even created. They couldn't explain the rules to fans because there were no rules, there were no play-offs.

 

"I am bound by board confidentiality to an extent and there were other reasons, but that weighed heavily on me. We were being asked to punish a club which couldn't have known what the rules were going to be."

 

Mulraney knows more than most the rewards and risks of the play-offs but is convinced of their value.

 

"In the long run, people will get used to the play-offs," he said. "Clubs who voted for the rules probably don't think they will ever be in them.

 

"As someone who is about to experience his seventh play-offs, I can say 100 per cent that they bring tremendous excitement to Scottish football.

 

"People are talking about the bottom of the Premiership and if we didn't have them then the top of the Championship would have been over long ago. It's a wonderful opportunity for Scottish football to sell itself."

 

Aberdeen chief executive Duncan Fraser added his voice to calls for unity.

 

"What it comes down to is that 42 clubs in June 2013 agreed unanimously to the rules," Fraser said.

 

"Some of the rules I don't particularly rate but you go along with them. You can't cherry-pick which you abide by.

 

"Last week in a meeting of the 42 clubs changes that were put forward were overwhelmingly rejected.

 

"It's important as a board that you respect all 42 clubs and do what's in the best interests of the company."

 

Where was the togetherness when the cnuts were kicking us when we were down. Togetherness my Auntie Fanny!

[barca72 440]

Where was the togetherness when the cnuts were kicking us when we were down. Togetherness my Auntie Fanny!

 

 

We are being cynically ostracized again.

[ian1964 10,761]

Rangers and Motherwell, who are already at loggerheads with the Scottish Professional Football League over its refusal to allow free admission for season-ticket holders to the forthcoming play-off matches, have been informed that they will receive only a fraction of the extra revenue generated by the televising of any ties they are involved in. (The Times, print edition)

[barca72 440]

When you consider the pittance we receive at the moment, that sanction will mean no big loss. However, for the other turkeys who continue to support Doncaster and Liewell it may be worth their while to realise how easily things are changed and manipulated to their own deprivation. Next year it is possible that they will not have the Blue Pound to sustain them, but will indeed have to survive on scraps from those who are running Scottish football.

It is better that we make the stand now and set our stall for the future. How long can this incompetance be tolerated by the clubs that are Scottish football?

[pete 2,499]

Rangers and Motherwell, who are already at loggerheads with the Scottish Professional Football League over its refusal to allow free admission for season-ticket holders to the forthcoming play-off matches, have been informed that they will receive only a fraction of the extra revenue generated by the televising of any ties they are involved in. (The Times, print edition)

 

Here is where we have the SFA by the balls. The whole play-off system across the whole of Europe is made for the TV companies to give extra coverage time. It is time to negotiate and threaten not to play. I read an interview from the person\agency who set up the Dutch play-offs and they are purely constructed for TV. Hold them to hostage on this and we will win. Refuse to play without negotiations.

[barca72 440]

Here is where we have the SFA by the balls. The whole play-off system across the whole of Europe is made for the TV companies to give extra coverage time. It is time to negotiate and threaten not to play. I read an interview from the person\agency who set up the Dutch play-offs and they are purely constructed for TV. Hold them to hostage on this and we will win. Refuse to play without negotiations.

 

I seem to remember the last time I read the SFA rules that a member club could not refuse to play in any competitions of the leagues under their control without facing sanctions. ( possibly even as severe as losing one's licence ).

[pete 2,499]

I seem to remember the last time I read the SFA rules that a member club could not refuse to play in any competitions of the leagues under their control without facing sanctions. ( possibly even as severe as losing one's licence ).

 

This SFA is so on a knife edge. Throw it up there!

[BrahimHemdani 1]

What is the ticket situation for Saturday?

 

I got one for both league games but nothing so far for the play-off game.

[forlanssister 3,114]

What is the ticket situation for Saturday?

 

I got one for both league games but nothing so far for the play-off game.

 

Received my confirmation email on Monday.

 

Think Supporters Club deadline for a special match application was Tuesday.

[der Berliner 3,803]

Derek Johnstone also lays into the SPFL ...

 

SPFL the big losers over play-off stance on Rangers season ticket holders

 

RANGERS were quite right to consider letting their season ticket holders into the SPLF Premiership Play-Off matches at Ibrox this month for free.

 

The directors were determined to thank the fans who have been so supportive of them during what has been a difficult campaign - and ensure a big turnout.

 

The SPFL were opposed to that move - even though Hibs did exactly the same thing last season as far as I can see.

 

And it now looks as if they could lose out on hundreds of thousands of pounds of much-needed revenue as a consequence of their baffling stance. I have no sympathy for them.

 

The governing body threatened to take what they are owed from money that is due to Rangers - from television money and other revenues - if their season ticket holders were given free entry.

 

Personally, I would have been astonished if the governing body could do that legally.

 

If Rangers had decided to let their fans in for free then I would have thought it would be very hard for anyone to take the money off them in any other way.

 

As far as I could see, it is money that belongs to Rangers. If the SPFL wanted cash from the play-off games they would have had to take them to court to get it.

 

But I can quite understand why the club has taken the action they have done to avoid either of those possibilities.

 

I am afraid the whole thing just smacks to me of yet another threat to the Ibrox club. There have been quite a lot of them in the last few years.

 

As I say, Rangers believed that Hibs set the precedent last year by not charging their season ticket holders for the play-off final against Hamilton. I thought they are right to go down that route.

 

The SPFL, meanwhile, say the rules were made up AFTER Hibs had started selling their season tickets. By all accounts, they are now going to change the wording of their regulations.

 

It seems to me like they make up the rules as they go along.

 

Something isn't written down one minute. Then all of a sudden it is the next. They just come up with it among themselves as they go don't they?

 

Hibs must have made a fair bit of money out of the final against Hamilton as thousands of their fans were there at Easter Road.

 

If Rangers get a half-decent result against Queen of the South in the first leg of the play-off quarter-final on Saturday, then they should be able to attract a good crowd to the next game.

 

By setting ticket prices at just £5 across the board, they should get tens of thousands of fans there and also satisfy the SPFL rules on the play-off levy.

 

But the governing body will get substantially less money than if they had just allowed season tickets holders in for free and Rangers had charged other fans £5, £15 and £20.

 

By charging £5 Rangers will ensure they get a decent crowd. That, in turn, will help the team's chances of progressing to the next round of the competition and will help the atmosphere.

 

If fans had felt that their hard-earned cash was going to go straight into the pockets of their rivals then they just wouldn't have gone along.

 

Many supporters would have been reluctant to pay out money in order for it to go to clubs who they feel have conspired against them and taken enough of their cash in the last few years.

 

It is nice to see the people in charge of Rangers standing up for the fans. It is not something you see a great deal of in football these days.

 

The man in the street is sick and fed up of the people who are running the game. With some justification too given many of the things that have happened.

 

I honestly think that if Rangers hadn't taken the action they have done then Ibrox will be less than half full for the rematch against Queens.

 

The fans want to be there. They just won't give their money to people who they feel have done them in over the last three years.

 

I appreciate why the SPFL do it. The money that is raised subsidises the parachute payment that is given to a top flight club if it is relegated.

 

But all these teams that have worked hard to finish second, third and fourth in the second tier have to give half of the money to the league. What a lot of nonsense!

 

It is an absolute joke. And it is a joke the top teams in the Premiership, who were in no danger of getting dragged into it, have pushed through.

 

It is a shame this row is overshadowing the play-offs because this is the exciting time of the season.

 

Queen of the South came out and said they wouldn't do it. But they don't have the same size of support as Hibs, Motherwell or Rangers.

 

To get any sort of crowd, they will have to charge the majority of punters going through the turnstiles.

 

However, the others were right to stand up and say: "No, we're not going to charge our season ticket holders."

 

I think the game at Palmerston Park in Dumfries this weekend will be well attended by supporters of both clubs. It will be a sell-out.

 

A week on Sunday at Ibrox will, depending on the result tomorrow, be the same.

 

But it could have been a different story if the club hadn't set prices at £5.

 

ET