Thinker

Is it just me or is that a reasonably sane compromise? I guess the suspended transfer embargo would be to give us time to stabilise our squad? Or, maybe no signings if we're promoted first attempt?

Seems like a non-story. All it takes is for the receivers to give the go-ahead.

I suppose, ultimately, you the ticket value has to reflect where you want to be rather than where you are.

So, in summary, their best offer to buy out Green was rejected, but they don't fancy being part of his consortium. So they just have to sit back and hope things work out like the rest of us. If Walter wanted us to boycott Green, I'm sure he'd just come out and say it.

You've got to conclude that either they don't believe there's anything to fight about, or they don't think they could win the fight.

True, you could take it as that, but you could also take it other ways. FFS! How hard is to release an unambiguous statement to the press?

They may well shoot themselves in the foot with this if they make claims about us that they can't prove or are clearly predjudiced or generalised (e.g. we're all bigots, we deliberately cheated by employing EBTs / withholding tax). There's a good chance they'll show themselves up to be the rabid, unreasoned mob that they are and lose credibility. You generally don't have to listen very long to a Rangers-hater before they start spouting bile and it becomes clear that their real motivation is bitterness.

Sometimes we see what we want to see. King (and also Walter and McColl) are clearly as suspicious of Green as the rest of us. Maybe, after discussion, he's been able to allay those suspicions. Here's hoping because we can't take another load of sh!te from another shyster.

I suppose this is all about the legal semantics. Do the supposed discretionary loans count as contractual payments? Do the alleged side-letters have any bearing on this? Hopefully we can answer this case satisfactorily. Otherwise SDM had better get himself some racing tyres.

Part of me thinks this is malicious, but it's probably just their usual brand of clueless incompetence.

It gets me that the same people that are piously demanding punishment are, at the same time, celebrating what has happened. I got that from a Tim at work the other day - "There's no remorse, and there's been no apology". I told him that there's plenty of remorse that we've given his lot an excuse for a party. I also asked who he expected to apologise to whom and on whose behalf and, predictably, he didn't have an answer. The EBT situation has never been resolved, so anyone who brings that up as a reason for punishment is out of line. And clearly CW ("Septic Legend") owes us an apology (along with £20million+) way before anyone else.

I don't want any favours to be done for us. We've been liquidated so we start again in Div3 - that's the way the existing rules work. If the SPL decide they need us they can invite us to rejoin - but any suggestion that we should take a financial penalty for doing something in their financial interest is ridiculous. That's the way I feel at the moment anyway and (I admit) it's not very deeply considered.

I think we'll see a few clubs go into administration, but unless they're unfortunate enough to have HMRC as the main creditor they'll stand a decent chance of coming out via a CVA in a downscaled form. All the SPL clubs will have to downscale - some in a more sudden, violent way than others - and one or two could potentially fold.

I think we'd all have more peace of mind with Walter at the helm rather than Green, but we've got to be realistic about this. You can't expect Green to walk away without recouping his money. It's easy to point to the fact that he wants to make a profit out of Rangers as a big negative, but I suspect (and I could easily be wrong) that he's basing his business model on what Fergus McCann did. He wasn't very popular and he made a fat profit, but his tenure paid off long-term.

I'd qualify that by saying we will be split as long as details continue to be so vague. It's almost impossible to figure out what's going on, so we all have to resort to guesswork. There's no single, logical conclusion we must all come to if we examine the facts - simply because there are so few known facts. The only way we could possibly be united at the moment is if we all admitted that we don't know what the feck is happening.

If Green's got any sense, yes is is a goer. Or the dubious sounding "binding contract" thing might turn out to be bogus, in which case it's not even up to him. So, in summary, I don't know.

He'll want enough to cover whatever he's forked out so far at least. Plus as much extra as he can wangle.

It's the worst of both worlds for the 10 non-old firm teams. I've often thought that if both Rangers and Celtic were taken out of the equation it would be a highly competitive league. Maybe not high quality but exciting and any team would have a chance of winning. Take Rangers alone out of the league and it's a one horse race with less money to spread around.

..and also lets a conman withhold a complany's tax for 9 months before publicly announcing they haven't received what they're due. Then, once the bill has built up to be too massive to repay in full, reject a compromise via CVA.

I truly hope that you're right, but I'm very, very worried. Ally's not just a manager he's a Rangers man. When Greig resigned last year I hoped that it was just because he and Whyte didn't get on.

No I didn't say he cares more than the fans - I said no one cares more than him. Because he is a fan. And the point remains: If he's fallen out with Green that's a very bad sign. If he'd left saying "I've done my job and now Green's got a really good plan to take it from here." That would be no problem. But from the (very vague, admittedly) reports we're hearing it sound like the man who ploughed on with the club despite CW's presence can't abide to work with Green. Does that sound hunky-dory?

Exactly. No one cares more about Rangers than Ally. If he can't get on with Green then there's real cause for concern about his intentions for Rangers.

I think there's a good chance this will ultimately end in the SPL breaking up. (For all the difference that makes.) We're responsible for over 25% of bums on seats, and probably a similar if not higher proportion of bums on sofas/barstools watching the games on telly. Less money, less interest outside Scotland, plummeting UEFA co-efficient. All the clubs can survive if they're prepared to scale down their operations, but Scotland is going to become a footballing minnow. But, considering the SKY deal the EPL got yesterday (3 billion I think it was?) what chance did any Scottish club have of making waves in Europe anyway?

The English league don't need us, and any other national is complete pie-in-the-sky. Is it possible to work up from the English non-league though? I have no idea if this is any more realistic than playing in Holland, but would it be feasible to hedge our bets by forming 2 newcos, one in Div3 and the other (which plays at Ibrox and shares other resources) in the English non-league set-up at whatever starting point is possible. That would give us a home game every week and the possibility of merging the clubs at some point in the future when the Scottish club has been in the top flight for few years and the English club has reached a high enough level (top of League 1 say). I'm just plucking ideas out of thin air here, so feel free to demolish that crazy scheme.

Well, we were apparantly making a loss of over £1million a month. We could afford it when SDM was rich and able to bankroll things, but not when he lost the majority of his fortune (hence his EBT shenanigans), and certainly not when he sold to a man without any money of his own.