BrahimHemdani

Turkey is the last place i would want to take my young Family. Totally different culture. Okay for the player maybe who is out and about but his wife and kids will be climbing the walls.

The people in Bursa were very friendly towards us and I daresay he would be fetted there but as you say the culture is totally different especially as it's in the Asian side of the country. Istanbul I could see but Bursa is really isolated 3/4 hours from there by road and ferry. It is expanding and there are a couple of moldern shopping malls but he would go crazy with Svensson the only westerner in the team and probabaly the only one that speaks English. No shortage of Kebab shops though.

He has been a bit of a mercenary throughout his career but this would be a step too far in my opinion.

May just be trying to put pressure on Brum to up their offer; but if my choice was between Brum, Bursa or Florence (albeit the latter two reputedly haven't made an offer), I know where I'd be going.

Boogie is out for Tuesday's game against ICT as well, so it looks like it might be -

 

:sw: :aw: :rf:

I am sure this is right, if he doesn't play Webster in this one, he never will. If he switches full backs he weakens both positions; though Whittaker is definitely more comfortable on the left than Foster.

or :rf: :lm: :sw:

 

Walter doesn't usually use Foster on the left.

He did today when he could have switched.

Also he COULD have brought on Jelavic and put Wylde to LB and gone three up, or 3-4-3 but usual conservative Walter; keep 4 defenders at the back against Hamilton's one man up.

Crikey I thought he would be signing up to finish his career. In that case I can well understand Miller looking at other options. If he signs a 1 year deal with us he may struggle to get something else next year.

Exactly and furthermore if his goals dry up or he comes a cropper in the second half of the season, he won't be going anywhere and he'll get a half price offer from us, so if I was him I'd be hot footing it down the M8 asap.

if Miller signs it would be a 2-3 year deal.

I think you may be wrong there, I am sure I read Miller is 31 and has only been offered 1 year at same or less money, hence his interest in 2/3 year deal at Birmingham (and more money + signing on fee). I'll stand to be corrected but this is from the Telegraph by Ewing Grahame 6:56PM GMT 07 Jan 2011

The 31 year-old, whose contract expires in May, has rejected several offers to extend his stay at Ibrox. Miller had sought a two-year agreement but that failed to materialise and now he is mulling over the terms offered by his former Scotland manager, Alex McLeish.

All I can think is that we don't have the money to replace him with similar or better quality this year, so the club are extending his contract for 1 year in the hope that we DO have money to replace him a year or so from now. The one year contract extension is precisely why we lost Novo as he wasn't willing to accept it, but Papac is more easy-going and is likely thinking that it's not ideal, but he'll deal with it later.

We do seem to have a policy that once you are over 30, you only get a one year deal and whilst this might be justified in the case of some forwards, it is more difficult to understand with defenders where Weir has shown that experience can be every bit as good a substitute for loss of pace at least in the SPL.

Papac has been a very sound defender for the past several seasons and has never been given a chance to perform in his best position at CB. It seems very short sighted on the part of the club to offer just a one year deal, as he could easily be our left back for another 2/3 seasons and could also slot in at CB.

We seem to be taking advantage of his family situation and it doesn't make sense to me from a footballing point of view unless we are sure that we have a ready made replacement which isn't apparent right now.

Papac is only 30 years old? He must have a good 4 seasons left in him - and if you think about Weir then maybe Sasa will still be here season 2020/21.

The way things are going maybe Weir'll be here in 2020/21.

I thought this was an astounding comment from cheaky Chick given that TV money in the SPL is a fraction of the revenue clubs generate from their fans. Even the small clubs like Chick's beloved St.Mirren generate far more money from fans than they do from the SPL's shitty broadcasting deals, while larger clubs like ourselves can pocket more from fans in 2 games than we get in a season for TV rights.

Overall just in terms of gate money fans contribute 4-5 times as much to the Clubs as TV.

Strange when you think of that, as he obviously looked at those, and other models that actually work.

 

Could be he was working to a certain agenda set by his employers.

Absolutely no doubt that the SPL wrote the 10/10 part of his report; no way did they independently come up with exactly the same plan.

He spoke to who he wanted to speak to and essentially took SD as representing the fan's view (sorry rbr).

Another thing - in a way parents caring too much (over protective) gets in the way of kids playing football. Kids in Argentina, Brazil and to a lesser extend the rest of the European countries are more likely to be out kicking a ball about. Now parents are too scared to let their kids out.

 

The fact is that it's pathetic that a country which takes football so seriously struggles to produce any good players at all. Even tiny countries way down in the rankings seem to get the odd world class player by chance. We haven't had a world class player since........????????

 

Uruguay is much smaller than Scotland and not a single Scottish player would get in their squad

There is a bit of a difference between playing your football on Copacabana Beach or Saltcoats but overprotection is a fair point nonetheless.

However, whilst Uruguay do disproportionally well in the World Cup, given their small population, they have failed to qualify for 3 of the last 5 and there some aspects of their foootball that I would not want to see us copying!

Maybe the SPL have had a rethink and come to the conclusion that popular opinion is actually important?

It would be nice to think so and Thompson was pushing the fans views in his interview with Spence last week (as were the DJ and others on Clyde), although I did have a concern that he was just using the survey for his own ends.

Therein lies the problem in that boys clubs are apart from senior football and amateur football is apart from junior football. there are no links to all the different levels of football. Why do Holland always manage to kick above their weight at international level and keep producing world top players is that the whole system is based on a pyramid. All levels from youth up to the professional game are all linked together. An amateur club is also a part of the community. Sometimes you have a family with three generations playing at the same time.(Grandfather,father and son). It is crazy in my view that the likes of Renfrew juniors is one team. A whole community should be playing for Renfrew juniors from 5year olds up to the granddad teams. It is crazy to me that once you become too old for a boys club that you are released to find an amateur team yourself. The top players will be scouted by senior teams but what a waste that some players will probably stop playing because they can't find an amateur team to play for.

An amateur club in Holland can have something like :

 

20 senior teams

7 A-teams,(u19)

8 B-teams,(u17)

10 C-teams,(u15)

11 D-teams,(u13)

15 E-teams,(u11)

11 F-teams,(u9)

From 5 until 7 most clubs have puppy leagues within their own club.

 

These clubs all have their own playing fields,training facilities and canteen where beer wine and soft drinks can be served which pays a huge chunk of the coaching costs. If you have 10 teams playing at home(20 teams) on a match day and everybody buys one drink then you have sold at least 220 drinks many pubs would die for that. Of course speaking from experience I know that home teams buy crates of beer and not glasses. Every senior player pays roughly 18 euro's per month membership, with the youth paying half of that.

This is indeed an example of a large club, a normal club will have between 4(village or small community) and 20(large community) senior teams.

The broader the base of the pyramid is the higher you can build up.

Interesting to see where this thread has gone!

If you could ally this Dutch pyramid model, with coaching in the schools, to the German model of fan involvement at all levels in the clubs, then that might some kind of footballing utopia. Now why didn't McLeish think of that?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/scot_prem/9351767.stm

This all seems extremely odd.

How could there have been plans for a vote on 17 January if there was a requirement for a resolution with 14 days notice following the last meeting on 4 January?

Did someone forget that there was such a requirement?

Did Steven Thompson just point this out to them?

Or was there never going to be a vote on the 17th?

Why didn't members of the steering group propose the necessary resolution with the required notice following the meeting on the 4th?

Perhaps because they knew it was doomed to fail?

In any event are Dundee Utd and others using this as a means to rest better terms on the TV money from the OF?

If he is on about �£15k a week then essentailly we are being offered more or less a year's salary to buy out the 6 months that are left on his contract and Rangers will probably also say that they "save" that 6 months salary which is another �£300-�£400k so they will say it's equivalent to a million pound deal.

I wouldn't blame Miller, he's served us well twice, any more than you would blame anyone else in any other walk of life that wants to earn more money. This will be his last big pay day and the point about a one year deal is valid, because then he would be 32 and much less likely to get a 2/3 year deal elsewhere and anything could happen between now and then.

Yes he should have been offered a better deal a year ago but then who was to know he would step up to score the goals he has this season.

He's been exceptional this season but I have a feeling that this is as good as it gets from him and if he stays till the end of the season for whatever reason and scores enough goals to get us into the CL then I would thank him and wish him all the best.

The RST should have been shut down in shame long ago but it will shuffle on as long as there are people willing to be flattered by position.

Or self interest, financial and otherwise.

Don't take it personally BH, at least you said your piece in the end and I think you were rightly given the credit you deserved for doing so. You certainly were by me and others on this site.

 

 

It's too late now but the person who spoke out and took on the RST careerists in public could have taken over the RST and gathered the wider support around him .... it's the leadership we always talk about but never find and it will never emerge by playing at committees. Just my view of course but what would I know about such elevated affairs?

I can assure you that I really appreciated all the support I received from your good self and many others on this site during what was a very difficult, quite literally sickening time for me.

You may well be correct about that but at the time I thought the best course was to try to form a consensus from within and I did have support from some quarters that you might find surprising. In my judgement the proper place to speak out was at the AGM but as you know I was denied that opportunity..................

What I find particularly shameful is that, with one exception, those who were of the same mind in Aug - Oct, remain on the Board to this day. I believe I was accused of self interest in certain quarters, in my case at least, nothing could be further from the truth.

I think you'll find that if you're aware of these particular issues then so are most others, myself included. That wasn't what I was suggesting.

Yes indeed, sorry about that.

sorry couldn't resist , and if it goes for anything I am certainly in the minority , league reconstruction wise

I think I got where you stand on that one!

Oh and by the way, I forgot to remind you about Bayern Munich 0 Raith Rovers 1

I wouldn't be surprised if Rangers are a far worse mess than has ever been made public.

I think that you'll find that the biggest obstacles to the sale of Rangers are the unresolved claim by HMRC and various issues about the possible development of the land in the SW corner.

The population has less to do with it than peoples mindset's , do the croatian kids work harder and have a better mental approach to training and football , or do they just want to go out and get wrecked , our kids are SOFT and spoiled

I agree with you on that as well, maybe it's the number of xboxes/ipods or wahtever per child that we should be looking at.

What a pity you didn't say as much when you were on the RST board as you did when you left.

I am sorry you feel that way.

When you are a member of a board, even the board of RST, there is a doctrine of collective responsibility, so it is very difficult to speak out in public against the collective view of the board and/or the office bearers and remain a member of the board. When I was elected in Sept 09, I thought that I could reform some of the practices and the first thing that I did was re-write the rules of Gersave and you would need to ask others why they were never implemented. When I accepted office as Secretary in Feb10 I specifically asked for the support of the entire Board and whilst they paid lip service to that it is abundantly clear that there were those who saw me as a threat to their way of conducting affairs. Nonetheless, I ensured that there were proper agendas and minutes for all Exec and Board meetings and against substantial opposition I successfully introduced an open and fair election process based on SD best practice. The reasons for my resignatiion as Secretary have been very well rehearsed: financial irregularities and mismanagement revealed by the audit of RST Accounts for the Year ended 5 April 2010 and the fact that it had become impossible for me to perform the role of Secretary due to lack of support by the Chair and others who had actively undermined my position. There is no point in going over old ground in that respect but again as I said at the time of my resignation from the Board in October "As you know it was my intention to resign from the Board at the same time as resigning as Secretary on 12 August 2010 but several Board members persuaded me to remain on the Board as they sought to remove yourself (Mr Smith) and Mr Mark Dingwall. At the same time I wanted to ensure that my financial management proposals were implemented in full." The moves to remove Messrs Smith and Dingwall failed so I had no choice but to resign form the Board.

In effect you try to do as much as you can from within but ultimately there comes a point when you have to decide if you accept that the changes you have made are enough or else you have to resign.

One other point if I may. The main reason why I joined the Trust and remain a member is that I believe in the principle of fan ownership or at least greater fan involvement in our and indeed all football clubs. There is no question that this is coming, in England at least a Select Committee has been established that will begin hearing evidence later this month. In Scotland, McLeish adopted many of the SD proposals in his report and I am sure we will see gradual implementation in the months and years ahead. What I didn't like about RST, and hoped to change (I didn't know anything about the governance issues until I joined the board and as you know I still didn't know half of what was going on) was the way they expressed themselves in public. Essentially that was controlled by SS, MD and David Edgar as the spokesperson. I tried on numerous occasions and in many different ways to have RST establish a policy on public pronouncements and had many a discussion with Mr Edgar about the way he expressed himslef in certain situations. I have a great deal of respect for his historic knowledge and ability to deal with the media but I often felt that his one liners (most notably comparing comparing SDM with Fred Goodwin of RBS) were shall we say less than helpful to our cause. I believe that one of the reasons why David stepped down was that he knew he had been compromised by much of what he had said in the press about the King/Park consortium bid in late 2009 and that RST's media persona needed a new face.

Now that we can see that that new face is the same old Mr Smith sprouting the same old nonsense, we can clearly see that RST has changed not one bit.

Do I regret that I wasted a year of my life on it, well I believe I did some good but ultimately I failed, so yes I have deep regrets, particularly as I still think it could do so much good.

However, I remain a director of SD and am doing my best to use the experience I have gained to benefit the trust movement in general and represent fans views in particular, which is one reason why I find the diverse views on Gersnet so valuable.

Regardless of your opinion about what I did or did not do as a member of the board of RST, I hope you will accept that I was honest and sincere and did my best. I am very sorry that my best was not good enough to bring about all the changes that I felt necessary.

Brahim I accept your idea re c/l football , however with the group stages of the Europa league and the fact that 2 out of 4 qualify then as we will be seeded and also the fact that there is slightly better monetary deals in place the Europa league is no where near as bad as it once was , we would be looking at approx �£8 million fron the groups which is approx half what we would get from the C/L , that is made up of 3 home games and selling our tv rights for �£500,000 per game , I might be slightly out though , but even �£6million before the group stages would help .

(If we finish second in the SPL) first we have to qualify for the Europa League! As things stand at present we would have two qualifying rounds to get through and although we would be seeded who's to say we would beat teams from the likes of Croatia, Slovakia, Georgia, Poland etc.

I bow to your knowledge of the financial arrangements in the EL but my point is the same regardless of CL (which may involve three qualifiers but more likely 2 and an "easier" route than in the past against the champions of so called lesser countries such as those mentioned above plus Serbia, Czech Rep etc) namely that from the bank's point of view firstly we have a differential in money between the CL and the EL and secondly there is no certainty that we will get past the qualifiers. Football is a very high risk business and when money was freely available it was a different story the odd �£30m here or there was no big deal, now it is a very big deal indeed.

One season without CL/EL group stage football could easily see us back at that level of debt in no time at all, my guess is that is what Lloyds are looking at.

we've been raped by that fat legless bastard (no apology).

I agree with a great deal of your comments MF but that comment is (a) inaccurate and (b) completely out of order. I am sure that on reflection you can find a better way to make your point.

it may not be as scientific as a SD supporters poll

Very droll rbr

I think that Mr Smith would be better placed sticking to the affairs of RST than commenting on the business practices of Lloyds Bank. We may not agree with them and they get themselves in trouble with their own greed but generally they are not vindictive. They make risk assessments and clearly their current assessment of the risk posed by Rangers (chances of winning the SPL and qualifying for next season's CL) is quite high and hence they want to reduce or even eradicate the overdraft facility. We may not like what that means for our club but to acuse them of being vindictive is just plain stupid.

This type of empty threat by RST, which is the exact same as made in late 2009, simply demonstrates the truth of what I said when I resigned as Secretary last August "that without a complete change of leadership and direction, the Trust is bound to fail because (it has) no credibility with the Club or the Rangers fans at large."