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I meant to post this a week or so ago. Following Dundee Utd announcing a significant financial loss recently, a loss that was underlined by a salary to turnover ratio of 133%, the evening Sportsound featured Jim Spence, Allan Preston and Chick Young. Jim Spence is a well known professional Dundonian, a man of the people, recognised as the senior legal opinion for most of Tayside and someone who cares greatly about sporting integrity. For the younger readers sporting integrity is something that was all the rage earlier in this decade. Anyway, I expected a full evisceration of Dundee Utd from Lord Spence, someone as concerned with financial probity as him would be ripping then a new one as they say in the High Court. Well, you can imagine my surprise when in fact it turned out that dear old Jim was in fact something of an apologist for Dundee Utd's reckless absentee owners. Apparently they've got deep pockets, have fallen in love with Dundee Utd (I know, I know) and see them as a long term investment. Indeed apparently their business plan will see them making money in the mid to long term. Incredibly this clear case of "financial doping" doesn't require criticism, simply explanation. It's a project, there's nothing untoward going on and everything will be fine. Allan Preston, a football agent who relies on working with clubs for his living, also saw nothing to worry about or question. It was left to an incredulous Chick Young, for possibly the first time in his life, to express what everyone else listening was thinking, namely WHAT THE FUCK??!! Yes, BBC Sportsound that evening made Chick Young sound measured, qualified and sensible. Who says it's not worth the licence fee. PS For some reason no Dundee supporters were invited on to give their opinion on Dundee Utd's problems. Again, a break with precedent surely.

We already had the article on the other thread on the accounts and I don't see the need for our forum to be infected by mad Celtic fans who throw doubt on our ability to trade through to the end of the season, no matter where they're published.

A few weeks ago I was contacted by and met a Joel Leslie who informed me that he has been researching the story of the Rangers team from season 1899 who of course set that incredible record of winning every league match, Joel’s aim is to publish a book on his work. During his extensive research Joel sadly discovered in Larkhall the unmarked grave of an integral member of this great Rangers team Neilly Gibson. The plot has been unmarked since 1947. We of course agreed that this would have to be rectified , Joel in turn got the necessary consent from Neilly Gibson’s family. We at the Restoration of Rangers Graves Project have donated a sum to assist the funding of this project. On Saturday 16th November at 12pm a dedication event will be held in Larkhall Cemetery, the cemetery is at Station Road Larkhall ML9 2DB. All Welcome. Neilly Gibson: NEILLY GIBSON joined Rangers when he was still a teenager from junior side Royal Albert and went on to enjoy more than a decade of service with the club. A man who would become a 14-times capped Scotland international, he would go on to win six major honours with the Rangers including four league championships. Defender Gibson was an ever-present in the 1898/99 league campaign when Gers won every one of their 18 matches to win the title by 10 points. Indeed, he scored three times in the two biggest wins that campaign, notching a double in an 8-0 rout of Clyde and scoring from the penalty spot in a 10-0 thrashing of Hibernian. That championship win was the first of four consecutively and in the first three campaigns Gibson missed only three games overall. Playing 377 times overall for Rangers – including in 184 competitive fixtures with 14 goals – he later spent five years in Partick Thistle’s squad. Gibson had three sons – Neil, Willie and James – with all three going on to follow in their father’s footsteps as they played the beautiful game. In James’ case, he emulated his dad by playing for Scotland and also scored once against Wales in 1929, some 32 years after his parent had struck against Northern Ireland. Neilly Gibson (1894-1905) Appearances: 184. Goals: 14. Honours: Four league titles, Two Scottish Cups. 14 caps (Scotland).

I'm not sure I see the relevance of 10IAR financially. We move onto the next season and try and win the league and do as well as we can in Europe if they do. I'm not bothered about XIAR. It's tainted as it was won off the park by them voting us down to the bottom division and and threatening others to do so. It's not worth anything. I couldn't even tell you what number this season would be if they were to win the League. We need to continue to rebuild and strengthen and we'll get there. Let's focus on ourselves and not the mob across the city.

(i) Rank Hypocrisy! Let's go back ten days, DrStu' is doing his petty and ill informed gig on, 'Off the Ball'. The guest is fellow Super Saintee, the actor Colin McCredie. You may remember his fifteen year stint in Taggart? Of course, he has something to plug. Whatever it is, you would be better served finding a burning orphanage to view. The real reason he turned up at PQ, apart from the peppercorn fee and further exposure; was to await the invitation to watch St Johnstone play Acas at Perth on an incoming live feed. DrStu' and Cowan extend the invitation and McCredie offers, "ah was wondering where I could watch the game"? It's the sense of entitlement available to the Gang Hut and their pals. DrStu' bangs on about his keen sense of injustice, it keeps him awake at night. It is really from the first whistle to the last for the Gang Huttees. Rangers supporters paying their BBC License Fee when Rangers entertained Acas did not receive live coverage from Ibrox. In fact, Sportsound went off air as the Ibrox game kicked-off. In fact, full live coverage of the Livi'/Celtic game had just ended and Big Dick handed over to Geoff Webster who spent two hours talking rugby/tennis/golf. Similarly, when Motherwell visited the stadium, full live commentary of Aberdeen/Sellik ended and again Big Dick handed over to fellow Dandy, Geoff Webster for more minority sport. Rangers License Fee payers on both Sundays received two thirty second reports from Rob McLean, interrupting the Webster flow. The rank hypocrisy of the entitled few exercising their privilege over the air, knowing the vast majority listening are paying. Rangers supporters in remote areas, infirm Bears, elderly and alone bluenoses, ..........etc - those where their radio/TV is their link to the outside world should know, DrStu' sleeps well.

Rangers takes this opportunity to remind supporters attending Ibrox for the Europa League match against Porto that they have a duty to represent the Club in the best possible way. More: https://rangers.co.uk/news/club/supporters-message/

While I enjoyed and agreed with the summary from @Bluedell it's important to remember that the loss was still the full £11.3m stated. Even if some of that figure relates to a previous accounting period and even if some of that loss can be regarded as relating to non-repetitious costs, the accounts nevertheless describe the extent of the journey yet to be undertaken. No matter how well these losses were predicted by the board, no matter how much they adhere to the current business plan, it would be negligent to assume that means we are now in long term security. We're not, yet. The present board has done a commendable job so far and no doubt is fully aware of our remaining challenges. I'm sure they also have a forward business plan to take us to a more sustainable operating regime. However, we remain a very long way from turning an operating profit and even closing the current deficit is heavily dependent on qualifying for European competition group stages every year - something that is a long way from certain. We also seem very dependent on the continuing health and commitment of a small number of key individuals, without which there's no guarantee the current business plan can survive. We're on the right track at last but that's all we are. We're nowhere near a situation where anyone should feel relaxed about the future. Getting better isn't the same as being fully cured. A great deal of remedial work remains to be done and the path is unlikely to be without its challenges. It's vital the board and supporters don't allow the ten-in-a-row issue to subvert or overshadow the rebuilding of Rangers. I'd love to see the financial projections for the next five years, to see how the board sees our income streams and profitability developing ... and how much risk is attached to each element of this. In this business you need to be heavy on caution, contingency planning and operate within reasonable safety margins. This is not to pour cold water of achievements to date, which are considerable, but merely to caution that what we've actually achieved so far is more about direction than financial security.

Terrible scenes but at least the operation went well and hes expected to make a full recovery.

It's not the full £11.3m noted. It's really the £8.7m figure that I refer to. The notional interest doesn't refer to a previous period or is a non-repetitious cost. Accounting rules have changed since you had your company. Let's say that Rangers owe £9m for players and there are directors' loans of £15m. We both understand that these are the amounts that are to be paid. However new accounting rules state that notional interest has to be charged on these amounts, so accounting entries of £1m interest for the players and £1.5m interest on the loans are charged. This means that in the balance sheet rather than £9m and £15m showing as being owed, it now shows £10m and £16.5m and we've got an interest payable charge of £2.5m in the P&L. This is despite the fact that we're only going to repay £9m for the players and the loans will probably be converted to share capital. We're never going to incur the £2.5m through the P&L. It's crazy, but that's the way that accounts are being prepared at the moment. Apologies if you understood that already but I fail to see why notional interest is an actual loss. I'd agree with your point on the non-repetitious costs and the fact that we've still got a way to go yet to survive without support.

Very much so. As I said earlier, it's not rocket science to see that most of what is going on is geared towards the first team stopping 9IAR and potentially 10IAR....and the main risk that I can see is fall-out if we weren't able to achieve it......It's something that isn't being talked about at a fan level for understandable reasons but from a business POV, it's more than just an outside possibility. The bookies would probably tell you that it's probable. Beyond that, the headline issues for me are: - Player trading - Retail - European group stage reliance / what modification of tournament set-up will mean (new 3rd trophy / Euro Conference) We need to normalise retail, start making substantial profits from player trading whilst having a team that can win the title and make European group stages more regularly than we ever have......A considerable challenge to say the least. I tend to think this is the season we have to win the title and IIRC it would fit exactly with what Paul Murray said back in April 2015, that it could take up to 5 years.

Some good performances from Kent and Jack but Morelos has to have it. Special mention for the groundsman. Was expecting a bit of a ploughed field given the weather and a game 24 hours before but the pitch looked great.

Maybe Ryan Jack really wants to go but I can't help but feel that we as a club should do the same with the player as part of managing his physical well-being. We desperately need Jack fit and healthy for the fixture list we have coming up.

Thanks mate. The problem with press coverage is that the current agreement was freely entered into by the current board so it's difficult for the press to criticise SD, and they'd be loathed to go overboard anyway due to the litigious nature of SD.

Son Heung-min red card for tackle on Andre Gomes overturned https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/50309594

Overview A loss of £11.3m has unsurprisingly made the front pages but are we really in such a bad shape? I’d argue that we are not for 3 main reasons: · The loss is funded by the directors/investors who have converted most of their loans into share capital. · We have no external debt · I will argue below that the inherent loss is well under £5m and can be contained by regular European football and the sale of players after development. What is the loss? The loss of £11.3m has been heavily publicised but the extent of the loss is misleading due to relatively new accounting rules, which make it harder to understand the accounts. Included in interest payable are net amounts of £2.6m of notional interest which is only there for accounting purposes and will never actually be paid and can therefore be ignored. I would therefore argue that the actual loss for the year was £8.7m. To highlight this, we had £2.3m charged through last year’s accounts, most of which were on investors’ loans. When the loans got converted to share capital, an amount of £2.8m got added back to retained earnings. That is the main reason why the retained loss in the balance sheet moved from £38.7m of losses to £46.8m, a movement of £8.1m and not the £11.3m that you would expect. Confused? Yeah, me too. It’s difficult enough for accountants to understand it, never mind the man on the street. The bottom line is that if the accounts were prepared 10 years ago, they would be showing a £8.7m loss. Results The £8.7m loss contains at least £3.6m of legal fees which will hopefully not occur in the longer term plus some additional player amortisation (the writing off of transfer fees) of £3.3m on top of the normal charge of £4m. There would always be an extent of additional write offs but this year’s seems very high (possibly due to some of Pedro’s purchases and Grezda?). The underlying inherent loss is therefore arguably well under £5m. Revenue Revenue increased from £32.7m to £53.2m (+£20.5m), mainly due to our European run. We received £6.4m in European prize money and £7.9m in gate receipts, a total of £14.3m, which highlights how important a run in Europe is to us. Staff costs Staff costs increased by a whopping 43% in the year, going from £24m to £34m, which was a result of bringing Gerrard to the club and a significant increase in the quality of the squad. This sounds bad but the following should be taken into account: · Staff costs as a percentage of revenue have actually fallen from 73.8% to 64.8%. The average for the English Championship, League 1 and League 2 for last season were 106%, 94% and 78% respectively, so it shows that the level we have it is reasonable, albeit based on European income, which isn’t guaranteed. · Celtic’s staff costs are 63% higher than ours. Other operating expenses Other Operating Expenses increased from £13m to £22m due mainly to · the costs involved in an additional 9 home games · the travel costs for our European games and pre-season · additional legal and professional fees of £3.6m, due mainly to the ongoing Sports Direct dispute Sale of players We made a £3.1m profit on the sale of players. I assume that Windass and Gilmour would make up a majority of that. However we need more of that to sustain a break-even situation in the future. Our model looks to be largely working as I’d argue that we have at least 10 players on whom we should be able to make at least a 7 figure profit. Retail Retail income was £3.3m for the year whereas it was probably under £500K in the prior year. This was offset by high legal costs of at least £3.6m. The legal costs for the current year may not be reduced and therefore there’s an argument that we are worse off signing the new agreement with Sports Direct than we were previously as we had an end date after giving our 7 years’ notice, whereas the current agreement appears not to have an end date. The full facts have yet to come out and therefore a full assessment can’t be made yet but, although the directors should take great credit for funding the club, it seems that they have not dealt with the retail situation well and we are not any better under the new arrangement which they signed. Cash I was initially surprised that the level of cash was only at £1m, but we have £14.7m of debtors which is season ticket cash which is in respect of season tickets that are paid by supporters using deferred payment plans or credit cards so that will be converted into cash. The credit card companies are passing on the cash over the course of a season to limit their risk. This isn’t an issue as it’s only a short term cashflow problem and it hasn’t prevented us from spending £10m on Kent and Helander after the financial year-end. However I may consider paying my season ticket by debit card rather than credit card in the future to allow the club to get the cash quicker. Funding The accounts show investor loans of £11m down from £23.4m after some were converted into shares, and another loan, possibly from Close Leasing, of £3m. There were additional investor loans of £5.2m provided during the year. Dave King has committed to providing an additional £10m this season and £5m next season which highlights the incredible commitment he and the other investors have to the club. Improvements There was £4.3m of fixed asset expenditure, presumably work done on Ibrox and HTC. This highlights that the directors are investing significantly in the club’s infrastructure as well as the playing squad. Sundry The club’s bankers have changed from the Metro Bank to Barclays. This is a further example of the normalisation of the club’s operations and it’s good to see that we’re now dealing with a bigger high street bank, and also removes questions created by Metro Bank’s issues earlier this year which saw a number of other clients leave them. Post year-end The accounts do not reflect the signing of Kent and Helander and they will appear in the 2020 accounts, although it should be remembered that the £11m spent will be written off over the length of their contracts. The future The losses over the last few years are not a concern as they have been fully funded by our directors/investors and we should be very grateful to them for that. We are able to continue to make losses while the directors continue to fund them but that cannot go on indefinitely. King has committed to fund us at least until the end of next season, so the level of losses are not an issue at the moment, and player sales, with hopefully in excess of £20m being realised for Morelos in the summer will put a much brighter light on our financial position. We do need to get regular European group football, sort out the retail side once and for all and regularly make profits on player sales in excess of £5m to allow us to break even and this is the business model that our directors have been putting in place. We know from bitter experience that we need to keep an eye on our financial position and my outlook may change over the next few years but I don’t believe that this set of accounts is anything to be overly pessimistic about. The loss isn’t great but it’s been fully funded. We are in a solid financial position and there are no short term concerns.

I don't know about the rest of you but my heart sinks when I see Ryan Jack in those Scotland squads. I understand that some players may still relish the kudos of being capped at international level but I hate seeing Rangers risk its best assets for an SFA that most of us detest and which has overseen 20 years of catastrophic decline in our so-called national game?

We have some decent individual midfielders but Clarke is yet to put together a collective midfield that really works well for us. The ominous lack of International class options at centre forward and the central defence make it very difficult to see any relative success in the short to medium term.

We have an excellent midfield and left backs but in the key centre back right back areas we have a distinct lack of quality.

Jack had another splendid outing, but I had to vote for the £40M man.

Well done @Bluedell Gave it a bump on the blog also, I hope it gets the necessary views

A calm, measured and well written summation - many thanks @Bluedell!

I think the risk regards our finances is being generally understated by our support and overstated by others, which is predictable. Partisan viewpoints are of limited value when it's objectivity that is really needed.

Really, ra Sellik View from Mike Meehall Wood? A twitter account lionising Phil McFournames, screaming in capitals, 'FCUK THE H-U-NS'. proclaiming TAL, mocking the deceased Sandy Jardine, hinting at FARE membership, and a disgraceful comment reference the Manchester bombing. Well, he has had his piece published in Forbes and it is now on our screens. That will be enough objectivity for BBC Scotland to reward him with a senior position.

Do we really need a Celtic fan's view on here? I'm sure we could go into the Celtic forums if we want to read how we're not going to make it to the end of the season but there's no need for it here.

BBC Scotland Journo's reaction to proposed General Election Date. Long term Sellik blogger, Stefan Bienkoski was rewarded for his faithful through and through approach by being hail hailed into the PQ Gang Hut during the last close season. Mostly, he pens match reports on SPFL matches. He has covered a few Rangers games, including Euro ties; and his grudging remarks can be quite entertaining. Obviously, he has still to come to terms with the move from blogging about his favoured club, to becoming an objective Journo' dealing with the fanatical levels of admiration required by the fellow Bhoys in the Gang Hut. Anyways, on hearing BoJo is set on the 12th of December as the date for the General Election, Stefan 's immediate thought is on Sellik's away Europa League game in Romania, against FC Cluj, "so a general election on December 12, the same day Celtic will have 10,000-15,000 fans in Romania". Now, Stefan assumes all those traveling come from Glasgow, because 15,000 missing the vote will significantly effect those marginal seats in the city. He is also worried about the demographic, "fans could sign up for postal votes, but we're talking about a largely 18-35 demographic of men. Can't imagine many will have that on their minds". The Gang Hut sophologist, Philip Sim(the oft' eulogised, Big Phil) contributes with a graphic claiming Scotland is a country of marginals. Stefan has been chastised, a lie is a more believable lie if it is tempered somewhat, "I've probably exaggerated the number of Celtic fans that will be out the country(haven't had any coffee yet) but even 4-5,000 could make a big difference in Glasgow". Ra Sellik's traveling support to Romania for the Champions League qualifier in August was under one thousand. I suspect Stefan would be better offering his fellow Bhoys the traditional Irish nationalist advice, 'vote early and vote often'?