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Some observations on what I think *could* be occurring: 1) DK wants to sell his holding to the fans to protect his legacy having saved the club. His family appear not to be interested and that could potentially lead to them selling to non-fans when he is no longer around. Such investment is likely to be viewed as an opportunity to derive a return, which may or may not align to the interests of the support and thus may have a detrimental impact on his legacy. 2) C8172 are offered the chance to buy DK's shares but have knocked back the chance to take part in share issues in the last year or so, probably due to lack of significant cash reserves from donating members. Having seen the chance to acquire such a large shareholding which clearly aligns to one of the CIC's generally accepted aims/purpose, they hatch a scheme to tie in a commitment from DK to secure the shares, but also need to buy some time to promote the legacy scheme in order to drive new members and donations to fund it. The club however changed the goalposts at the AGM and subsequently afterwards, which has pulled the rug from C1872 and DK. They have then re-negotiated to maintain the commitment to acquire DK's shares, but allow them to participate directly in share issues over the coming months using the new legacy income and other donations as funding. As part of this negotiation, DK has sought a commitment from C1872 that they still are intent on acquiring his shares and this has led to the first £250k purchase announced this week. *If* this is indeed what is happening, I'm sure that it could be explained reasonably to members and would be accepted. However, my call for better and more transparent governance of C1872 remain. Until then, whispers and innuendo about the motives of the Board and associated helpers will continue to drive a wedge between C1872 and the wider support. The bottom line is that as a founding member and participant in the legacy scheme, I shouldn't have to be reading between the lines like this. We deserve better.

As our podcast continues to go from strength to strength, I've taken an opportunity to partner up with a new official club app which is on the way: RangersPicks.com The headlines from this are as follows: · The new official Rangers Pick’em game – ‘Rangers Picks’ – is now available to play for EVERY Rangers match. · Rangers will officially launch the game in the new club app (due in the next fortnight) but we can play now. · Rangers Picks is a totally free Pick’em game with a £1,000 prize pool – Powered by Low6* · The club makes money from this so the more fans that play, the more money the club receives. · To play today all you have to do is hit the link, complete 12 questions about this week's match and give yourself the chance of winning a share of £1,000. · You must be over 18 to play, T&C’s apply and please always remember to play responsibly. I'm conscious that this is advertising but monetising the site/pod likes this allows me to maintain the quality of our content going forward so I do appreciate everyone's understanding when it comes to this kind of promotion. If you can take part, then fantastic and going into next season we may well have a forum league table which we can use to give out our own prizes in conjunction with the Prediction League. * - Low6 are working with Rangers on the stadium WiFi, new club app and Rangers Pics.

It's impossible to watch that without a smile on your face. If Steven Gerrard ever needs someone to give squad morale a boost......

No need for any code lads. ??

it won't

Worth noting the stats on the site/app are taken from OPTA so are usually interesting and helpful when making your picks. For example, I didn't realise that despite scoring two goals this season Kamara doesn't have any assists. I wonder if that will change on Sunday?!

Agree....if memory serves match screened live on the BBC.

We could do with a Durrant type player on Sunday

Durrant was only 19 when he scored that goal. Totally bodying Davie Cooper is pretty funny actually, particularly after one of the best 'assists' you'll see.

Cooper ddin't deserve to be planted by Durrant in the celebration ?

Agree that didn't seem to make much sense and the decision making should be more transparent. Again though, clearer communication/updates would be helpful.

Thirty years ago Aberdeen beat Rangers 2-1 at Pittodrie. But that game is not remembered for any of the football played By Steven Pye for That 1980s Sports Blog Life was pretty good for Rangers fans at the start of the 1988-89 season. Seven wins out of eight in the Premier Division – including a 5-1 destruction of Celtic, who had won the title by finishing 12 points ahead of them the previous season – had catapulted Graeme Souness’s team to the top of the league. Rangers did suffer their first league defeat on 8 October, but that in itself was no disaster. Their loss at Pittodrie to an unbeaten Aberdeen side was hardly a shock. However, the events of that afternoon would have far-reaching consequences for some of the players involved and both sets of fans. With the emergence of Aberdeen as a force in Scottish football under Alex Ferguson, a rivalry developed between the two clubs – emphasised by two fiery matches in 1985 – and the antipathy showed little sign of abating when Souness arrived on the scene. The landscape of Scottish football was shifting; Ferguson had departed in 1986 and Souness, backed heavily in the transfer market, was delivering success to Rangers once more. Their great start to the 1988-89 season was the beginning of Rangers’ run to nine titles in a row. If the flames of the rivalry between Aberdeen and Rangers had been flickering before their meeting in October 1988, a huge barrel of fuel was poured on to that fire in the fifth minute at Pittodrie. Neil Simpson’s horrific tackle on Ian Durrant would cement the hatred forever. Be warned: if things like this make you feel a squeamish, it might not be best to follow the YouTube link of Simpson’s tackle on Durrant. Challenges had already been flying in beforehand, with former Aberdeen midfielder Neale Cooper laying down a few markers in a Rangers shirt. Sadly, Durrant was about to be on the receiving end of one tackle too many. With the ball loose in front of the Rangers box, Simpson and Durrant headed towards each other. The Aberdeen midfielder, went completely over the top of the ball and stamped down on Durrant’s leg, the full horror of the injury clear for all to see on the replays. Football during this decade was a tough business, but quite how Simpson remained on the pitch is a mystery. “Durrant’s exit after five minutes’ play should have been followed by the departure of his assailant, Simpson,” the Times reported. It was a sending off in any era. Durrant lay on the turf in agony, desperately in need of medical attention. Astonishingly, he had to leave the pitch on the back of physio Phil Boersma. “At the time, the medical service said the only available stretcher was outside the ground in an ambulance,” Durrant recalled later. And some people bemoan that health and safety has gone mad. The tackle did little to calm matters and the challenges continued to fly in, with both Alex McLeish and Ally McCoist suffering cuts in a match that the Times described as “blood and blunder.” Occasionally there was some football played, Aberdeen eventually running out 2-1 winners. Cooper gave Rangers the lead – no refusing to celebrate a goal against your former club on this day – but second-half goals from Jim Bett and Charlie Nicholas secured the points for Aberdeen and inflicted a first league defeat of the season on the visitors. Unsurprisingly, Rangers were furious. Skipper Terry Butcher was later fined £500 for kicking a hole into the referee’s dressing room door, with Souness unable to contain his anger. “We accept that every game we play is a cup final for the opposition,” said Souness. “But it’s very difficult to restrain my players under the provocation we experience on many occasions, such as Saturday’s match at Aberdeen. The whole of Scottish football should be concerned with the tackle that has threatened Ian Durrant’s future as a professional footballer.” With his cruciate ligaments in his knee torn by the challenge, Durrant’s faced a battle to play again at the top level. He had a four-hour operation the Monday after the match and, after another session under the surgeon’s knife, he went to the US for a second opinion and yet more surgery. “When I eventually went to America to get it fixed, they couldn’t believe what the Scottish surgeon had done to my knee in terms of how he had rebuilt it.” The midfielder, rated as one of the brightest prospects in Scottish football, continued to battle back to fitness and eventually made his Rangers return in 1991, when around 30,000 fans turned up to Ibrox to watch him play in a reserve match. It’s a testament to his character that he returned at all, but Durrant never shone as brightly again. “I was never going to be the same player,” he reflected later. “I went from being a runner breaking the lines to being more of a passing player. My whole game changed. I never had the spark that I used to have. I lost a few yards, which was a big part of my game. I had to adapt and use my left foot more than I did because of my injury. I was predominantly right footed. All I did in training was kick the ball with my left foot.” Durrant went on to win major honours after his comeback and starred in Rangers’ memorable European Cup run in the 1992-93 season. Having been robbed of almost three years of his career, he sued Simpson for £2m and later accepted an out-of-court settlement reported to be around £350,000. It is hard not to think of what might have been though. There was one certainty surrounding the whole affair: the uneasy relationship between the two clubs was now at the point of no return. Willie Johnston’s stamp on John McMaster in 1980, the rise of Aberdeen as title rivals, and Rangers’ resurgence under Souness all combined to add to the growing tension between the two clubs. The Simpson challenge on Durrant is often seen as the tipping point. With some Aberdeen fans singing about the tackle on Durrant and the two clubs continuing to contest for major honours at the end of the 1980s and into the early 1990s, there was no chance of the bitterness evaporating. The rivalry is still very much alive three decades on from that fateful day. https://www.theguardian.com/football/that-1980s-sports-blog/2019/feb/06/aberdeen-rangers-horrific-tackle-changed-rivalry-durrant-souness

Appreciate the reply mate, I only signed up (or tried to!) to give Gersnet the click through, things like this don’t really interest me so there’s no way I’m going to give passport and card details to a company I’ve never heard of and that I won’t ever use. I will do a few click throughs on the adverts on Gersnet instead!

Glad you brought that up as I meant to mention that. It is free but obviously they're bound by Gambling Commission rules. As part of that, I think random ID checks are made on a small percentage of players (I was one as well actually) so a few of us will be asked to submit some ID (which will be deleted by Low6 immediately after they do their check). I think it's something like 10% of players that might be subject to this check based on their algorithm. Your data will be well protected.

Tried to do this but it’s asking for debit card details ? Also just got an email from them wanting my passport, not a chance. I thought this was just a free bit of fun?

I did the calculation of what it meant when the issue was first raised. Can't remember what the answer was and whether in posted it here or FF but buying from the club rather than King would give them 23% (from memory..I can't remember the exact figure but it was round about that).

You dont want him pleading guilty if it goes to a trial it all comes out names dates and times

Ah crap, aye, i just signed up without any affiliate code

It is a bit. Be interesting to see how it pans out with these two.

An absolutely fantastic player, he was class, yet in Scotland they celebrate that tackle that should have ended his career but it did stop him becoming a world class player.

Aye, about 65% of that goal was down to Cooper. I could watch that side step shuffle all afternoon. I had various favourites over the years, Parlane, Jardine, Russell but Cooper was the player that really excited me. I got in after my first ever week away from home with the school (Loch Tay) and my Dad had kept the newspapers to show me Cooper had signed from Clydebank. I was estatic, happier than at any point during that week.

No-one gets near to the Clancy level. We've been fairly fortunate to have encountered Aberdeen twice this season when they were powderpuff. Not to say we wouldn't have beaten them anyway, but it was made a lot easier. I don't know what condition their squad is in for this game but we are significantly weaker without Jack, Arfield and Roofe. Still, lots of decent options. I reckon on one change from last week, Hagi for Roofe.

I see the SPFL/SFA are upping their game, giving cheatin Beaton the big game this weekend. Oh well, we will have to be extra careful and overcome 12 men as is usual up there. I was amazed they didnt give him or Clancy the OF game.

it's only a rivalry when they are any kind of threat to us. they still are a bit but it's waning. Sunday is a huge game again.