Bluedell

I was just posting that (and giving you credit) at the same time as you posted it.

IIRC, Murray brought in Enic around that time. It allowed him to spend cash that previously wasn't available. As 26th of Foot always says, he was a gambler. He always believed that he could raise more cash. after he spent Enic's cash, he used Dave King's (plus a bit of his own), then NTL then JJB. He was confident in his own infallibility in raising more cash for the club. It was this gambling streak that finally brought his business down as he financed the purchase of property with short term loans rather than mortgage related finance so when the financial crisis happened in 2008 he was screwed.

I'm sure that we have had this conversation before but: When Azure was set up, Murray owned 70%. In its 3rd year of trading, its turnover was £4.4m and losses were £28K. Azure was sold in 2004 to Eliance Events Ltd, a joint venture between Elior (51%) and Murray (49%). Its losses to date at that point were £2.2m. in 2005 and 2006 Azure's turnover was around £14m but they made losses of over £600K in both years. In 2008, Murray sold out his shares to Elior. As for the "For every pound he injected into the club after 1998, he took in excess of £11 out" we had to pay someone for the services and why not a Murray company? Easier to control. How much of that £11 was pure profit? Unknown but it could have been £1.50-£2.00, or even less. The big unknown is whether the services that the Murray companies doing so at market value? Was there a competitive tendering system? There's a lot to criticise Murray for but we should make sure we're making the correct arguments.

The "staying to the end of the Japanese season" rumour has apparently been denied by Muscat's people, according to H&H.

No. He didn't know who they were (or knew and wasn't saying).

Apparently he's one of several "football" people that have been advising the board (as per Davie Edgar).

My recollection was that he didn't play that much in the league for us, and checking back, sure enough, he only started 12 league games in the 2007/8 season, but I was surprised that he started 36 out of the 38 league games in the 2006/7 season.

If we had a DoF, is there any guarantee that he would have overruled Beale on some of his signings? Beale did a good job with regards to getting in the players he wanted. The quality of these players is a different matter but that's easy to argue about it with hindsight. Where the board did let us down in not having a DoF was moving some players out. It doesn't seem that Beale was too invested in ensuring we got players out the door. The other area that Beale totally ignored was looking at the make-up of our Euro squad and the lack of homegrown players. Again, I'd have hoped a DoF would have insisted that more attention was paid to this.

Apparently my source was talking crap. Apologies. I posted in good faith. Sorry again.

I'm hearing Clement has been offered the job.

I don't understand the clamour to drop Davies.

St Mirren 3 Gers 1 Tav

The SPFL have announced that cinch will terminate their title sponsorship of the SPFL at the end of the season - TWO years early. The used car dealer has triggered an early exit clause in the five-year contract they signed with the Scottish football's league body in 2021, forcing CEO Neil Doncaster to look for a new sponsor next season. The £1.6million per season agreement - hailed at the time as the SPFL's 'largest-ever' sponsorship - proved hugely controversial as Rangers refused to take part in any promotion for cinch, citing a conflict with former chairman Douglas Park's own used car firm, Park's of Hamilton. The long-running dispute went to court before the deal with the online car company was eventually revised last year, excluding Gers from having to display any cinch branding within their stadium or press conferences. The Light Blues later claimed another off-field victory as the SPFL were forced to offer a grovelling apology over the embarrassing episode and pay towards legal costs. And now in a statement, the SPFL have said: "The Scottish Professional Football League has announced that cinch has exercised its right to conclude its title sponsorship deal at the end of the current season. The SPFL and cinch signed a five-year contract in 2021, which gave cinch the option to exit after three seasons. The deal played its part in helping the SPFL deliver record-breaking revenues back to its 42 clubs in the last 12 months." Doncaster said: “cinch has been an excellent sponsor for the SPFL and has been clear on the significant boost to its brand awareness from our partnership. We will, of course, ensure that cinch continues to enjoy the many benefits of its sponsorship of the cinch SPFL for the rest of what promises to be a hugely exciting league campaign. “The passion, drama and excitement of the SPFL has played a leading role in driving cinch’s considerable brand growth in Scotland and across the rest of the UK. Working closely with Scottish Football Marketing, we will now begin the process of securing a new title sponsor for next season and beyond, and anticipate strong interest from businesses which recognise the unique value of partnering with Scotland’s premier football competition.” Robert Bridge, Chief Customer Officer of cinch, commented: “Over the past three years, cinch has become the UK's leading online used car business and built a household brand with awareness of over 85%. Its successful partnership with the SPFL has been an important contributor to this achievement. As cinch looks to the future, its marketing focus is evolving to ensure continued success and growth.” SPFL announce cinch sponsorship will END two years early as deal to be terminated in 2024 - Football Scotland

It's interesting to see that there's no clear favourite, if we are typical of the wider fanbase, which is good as it seemed that the board went with the fans' favoured candidate on the last 2 occasions. It's also interesting to see that nobody has gone for Lampard. The poll on FF had some interesting names that weren't covered on here: Papszun Moe Boas Nistelrooy Favre Pereira Kuntz Glasner Lopetegui Wicky I don't know if these guys are realistic but some have more experience and are more appealing than some of the ones on the rumoured shortlist.

You've taken that too far!

It's free if you have Sky. However you then need to register to get access to TNT Sports within Discovery+. I followed a QR code that they showed onscreen last night that took me into the Discovery+ website and it worked. I had thought it happened automatically but it doesn't, but at least there's no additional costs.

But some are riskier than others. I've highlighted where I felt the risk was at too high a level....but as I said, I don't really know that much and my views are fairly uninformed.

It's a pain that the CL goals show is no longer on Sky. Have to watch it through Discovery+ and it took a while to figure out how to tell it I've got a TNT Sport subscription.

Non-starters: Davis - No experience and therefore too big a risk. Gallardo and Potter - won't come. We'd as well adding Jose to the list as rumour has it that he's about to be sacked by Roma. Lampard & Parker - their managerial resumes do not fill me with confidence. McInnes - no ambition and turned us down before. Would not be accepted by the support. Warnock - he's 75 and has retired. That leaves 5: Knutsen was my choice last time. However he's never managed outside of Norway so is a risk and wants a % of player sales. We can't have a manager who is willing to weaken the team for financial gain. Hasenhuttl - has never had a 50% win percentage at any club. Seems to work best with a DoF. Got Southampton relegated. A bit of a risk. Jansen - there were concerns raised by SBG and others about him in the "Rangers part company with Beale" thread. A guy I don't know too much about but appears to be a risk. Muscat - seems to be a bit like following the Ange model and hoping it works for us. It's difficult to assess a manager of someone who has managed in Oz and Japan. Concerns have been raised by his poor record in Belgium. Seems a risk. Clement - did well in Belgium, winning the league 3 years in a row and did OK in France, although his team did fall away a bit last season. He'd be my choice from this list. But I wanted Le Guen so what do I know 🤷‍♂️

Nope, no way. Not interested. I'm not sure what he's done as a manager to suggest that he should be Rangers manager. The style of football his teams play isn't endearing either. The fact that he turned us and Sunderland down suggests a major lack of ambition on his part. I can't see him coming in a shaking up the place and making difficult decisions. He didn't feel up to doing it in 2017 so why would it be any different now?

Aris 0 - 1 Rangers FGS - Tavernier

Why does Jansen strike fear into you?

I agree with that but I can't figure out why the team this season looked as if there had been little coaching and didn't have a style of play. Gerrard's team was structured and did have a defined set-up and way of playing and Beale must have had a fair bit of input into that so where did his coaching ability disappear to? All very strange.

They really aren't better than what we've got now. While I'm not against giving Devine some game time (he's better than Sterling IMO), he's still not as good as Tav, even if Tav's not having his best season again. King has 4 better centre backs in front of him. Lowry isn't getting many starts at Hearts and still needs to work on his game before he's ready for regular first team appearances. I haven't seen seen that much of Rice but when he was brought on the other week, he didn't go looking for the ball in the same way as some of the other midfielders. It could be that it was just nerves or was understandably overawed but I didn't see enough of him to say that he's better than, say, Lundstrom or Jack.

I haven't seen the goals back but I thought Davies was the best of a bad lot.