calscot

This is where it gets contentious and you're falling into the usual trap. Which songs were sung that are bigoted? The Scotsman recently said that the Sash was a bigoted song. Now I think that is a cringe-worthy song for any man to sing but I can't see how it's bigoted. The Times has labelled our national anthem and Rule Britannia as bigoted. The "previous" you mention is 100% unqualified by Fair and could easily be complaining of such innocent songs. You're applying the notion of spin to Leggatt but not Fair. There may not be previous in Alloa but they have previous for their song list so disagree there too. The contention for them is qualified by mentioning songs in their normal repertoire which support the IRA. Other songs are not anonymously labelled as bigoted. Unless I've read it wrongly, it seems that the same applies to the OO. The only minors invited were in the band. I also don't see much reference to the ban on minors for the CSC event. That depends on whether they actually sang bigoted songs. We only have Fair's word for that. I'm not agreeing 100% with Leggatt but the lack of real facts makes either interpretation open to question. It seems to me that quite a bit of the so called bigotry is open to interpretation and needs to be sorted out, but any incitement or support of terrorism should be abhorrent to everyone and not so obviously condoned IMO.

I don't think it's very different at all. Leggo has got fairly it right but maybe exaggerated the point a tad. Fair seems to be using the kids thing as his angle for denying the licence but easily brands the behaviour of the OO as highly bigoted without qualification. If he was even handed he'd be making the same representations about the IRA songs and insisting children don't attend. It seems neither event invited children except those playing in a band. To be honest I think Fair sounds quite slanderous but it depends on how bigoted the OO actually behave. Seems to me though, that there are a lot of Scots and Irish who seem to find it impossible not to stop themselves singing religious and bigoted stuff but can't bring themselves to actually act in a way consistent with the teachings of the religion that they purport to patronise. To be honest, even the mild extremes of both sides seem like a bunch of weirdos to me.

That's my take on it plus he's now scratched the Premiership itch and getting into his ââ?¬Å?seniorââ?¬Â years. One of his prime motivations for leaving for England he claims was that his international manager advised him to do so if he wanted to play for Spain. Three years later and he still doesnââ?¬â?¢t have a cap to his name and now hardly playing for his club, his priorities have changed. He won both cups with Rangers but was denied the championship (by nefarious machinations of a club with no shame) He also played in a UEFA cup final and won two player of the year awards plus Rangers player of the year. He was also put on a pedestal by Rangers fans and was the first name on the team sheet every week. He must be watching with at least a tinge of envy and regret while Rangers have put together three titles in a row in his absence, as well as taking a domestic cup home each season and playing in the Champions League in two of those years. Without a move to a top five club, you have to think the only compensation for being where he is, is his larger pay packet and the knowledge heââ?¬â?¢s playing (now and again) in a top European league. Iââ?¬â?¢ve always believed thereââ?¬â?¢s fun to be had a Rangers and the remuneration is not exactly breadline stuff. Sometimes it just takes a bit of character to see it and overcome pure money motivation. Time will tell if Carlos puts his money where his mouth is.

That does not change the belief that flying an irrelevant flag as a provocation is not something that should be found socially acceptable. They may not be quite lunatics but there is something not fully rational and decent about such people.

It is all stories and it's sometimes impossible to know what to believe. However, I think yours may be Timmy inspired. Rangers were starting to sign Catholics when Ferguson was offered the job, with John Spencer being the first for a while. He may have said something about his Catholic wife but he'd already played at Rangers while being with her. Souness also had a Catholic wife and said the same thing and he took the job while saying Rangers didn't have a sectarian sigining policy and proved it. Ferguson could have easily done the same. If the story is true then I think it's more likely related to the story he was sold by Rangers because he married a Catholic. However, the football story is that he was Rangers captain, Rangers didn't win anything and he was considered the scapegoat. But it could have been something else. Here's a quote from the man in a Sky Sports interview: "Of course I was offered the Rangers job in 1983 but I just felt having done so well with Aberdeen and having had such a great relationship with the chairman Dick Donald and the vice chairman Chris Anderson it would have been a kick in the teeth to them to go to Rangers. "So I felt the best thing would be to go to England and I always remember Dick Donald telling me that the only club that would satisfy me was Manchester United. Amazingly I was there five or six months later and I had no inkling about it." http://www.rangers.co.uk/articles/20110510/we-could-have-been-gunners_2254024_2357433 Who knows?

One article I read was that SAF was offered the job and came for talks. He wanted a Souness type transfer budget to turn Rangers into a top European club but instead he was offered the budget eventually given to Jock Wallace. The story goes that THAT is the reason he turned us down. Then two years later, Holmes is given the reigns and Souness gets the budget SAF asked for.

Seems to me that Whyte is just being cagey until the tax case is resolved. He seems to have planned for optimistic, pessimistic and neutral scenarios - as a good businessman would... If we win the case or only take a small hit then it is likely that the debt will be waived. If we lose and take a big hit, it won't be but the club may have to go into administration and money will have to be found to dig us out of the tax hole to keep us as a going concern and therefore the debt will need to be repaid. In a middling scenario, you would expect some of the loan to be turned into share equity and perhaps some owed depending on how much the tax bill is. I think people are confusing rightfully protecting one's interests with something a lot more nefarious. Perhaps that heightened scepticism bordering on deep suspicion is SDM's real legacy.

Anyone else find this bit amusing - " The consideration for the Acquisition was �£1, satisfied in full in cash"?

Without rumours and made up stuff the press have nothing to give to fans hungry for the latest signing. The problem is that many of the rumours used to have foundation when we had money to spend and they were exciting rumours too. Now we sign very few players and the media competition is huge so they link us to just about anyone within our budget. It's so bad now that it's just boring.

The problem with playing Weir for another season, and another, is that eventually he'll just not make the grade. Just because you did well last year doesn't mean you have another year in you. However, if we take him on as a defensive coach and also register him as a player, he could come in handy during and injury crisis or to rest a defender who is not quite fit.

The IRA are not only sectarian, they are also racist. Celtic should be hammered on both counts.

Surely everyone understands the transfer window? It's to stop the bigger clubs supplementing their playing staff at any time when they have a load of injuries or are just not doing so well, and also stops smaller clubs from starting with a small squad and then buying a load of decent players when they see that they they need a bit more to avoid relegation or to qualify for Europe or something. Basically it's to stop teams buying their way out of trouble.

PS With the way technology goes it would probably be better to buy cheaper, new screens than fix the old ones. I bought a 30" LCD telly seven 7 years ago for �£1650 and it only has 1280x768 resolution, a contrast ratio of 500:1 and doesn't even have HDMI in. Now you can buy a super slim, 42", LED tv with 1960x1080 resolution, 5000:1 contrast ratio, 4 HDMI sockets and built in Freeview for about �£450. Surely it's the same with jumbo screens?

I found the screens useful if there was play at the diagonally opposite corner and the light was fading. I couldn't really make out what was happening with the naked eye but the screens were pretty clear due a bigger brighter picture than real life.

Nah, don't like that kind of music. Can we have rock please?

Something to be thankful to SDM for. I think, despite all the fears, we'd have squeakier bums had this Russian guy taken over instead. SDM has his very obvious flaws but you have to give him some credit for the way he sold the club for a quid to what looks like the best candidate on paper.

There's an obvious pyramid of ability with Messi right at the peak.

It would be paradoxical if they all made it - Rangers want the best 11 players in the country, they can't all be the best.

There's probably better teams that you could make from Murray Park graduates but here's a not bad one: MacGregor Hutton Ross Wilson Smith Burke Adam Ness Wylde McCormack MacLean

When it comes to control of a business, what matters is how many shares you have, not how much you paid for them. Dave King could have had the shares for �£1 too if he'd done the same deal as Whyte - however he'd also have to stump up another �£43M from somewhere. He had his chance and passed.

I wouldn't want Burke or Adam back. They both left for a reason - they didn't make the grade at Ibrox. The fact they've done well elsewhere does not change that. If Adam goes for �£12M he will be the most overpriced Scottish player ever - in the bracket of Tore Andre Flo. The one ex-player I wouldn't mind back is Hutton who left against his will due to the transfer fee. However, we can no longer afford him. BTW I'm bricking it that a Welsh team will get promoted - it will be galling if they start pinching our players or out bidding us for others due to having more money. It's bad enough tiny English clubs doing it, but I couldn't bare Welsh clubs being richer than us.

The criticism may have some validity but he's taken it too far and it's incredibly disrespectful. It's the kind of comments that makes me have no interest in English Football and the desire for England to lose every game. It's understandable that with the difference in resources that Scottish football have is not of the same standard as the Mickey Mouse EPL - and I mean Mickey Mouse in that it's not a real sporting league but a fantasy one created by false wealth which can't even sustain itself with football money. The SPL is at least a real league with most of the best of Scottish talent on show (however, good or bad that may be), mostly paid for by Scottish fans. Coming from Newcastle, his dig at Rangers is laughable - does he know who are the only team not to concede a goal at Old Trafford last season? As for the quality of the games, I've seen bits of English games and outside the top four, I've hardly been impressed. However, perhaps he'd have been less scathing if Celtic had actually put a European run together...

The obvious irony is that it is their massive efforts in their own agenda against us which is has started something which will now turn against them. The stupidity is that I think they really do believe they do nothing wrong and so they totally didn't see this coming at all. Maybe it will be good for the game after all. And they have far more to lose. What we have to lose is mostly what we needed to lose anyway. For them, it's their raison d'etre. I really hope we clean up our act as the baggage we carry is actually defined by them and the trouble is that the minority of the ignorant, the arrogant and the unsavoury element among us, actually take it to heart and start to believe it - at least on match days. It should be really easy for us, all we have to do is drop references to the pope, the Catholic church, the Irish and fenians - some merely by word substitution. it shouldn't really be too hard - except for those who ARE bigots.

Can I ask WHY you sing those songs? I always thought for most it was just to wind up the Tims, but you seem a bit different... I can understand people singing songs at or around the context football matches, but outside the game they start to look a bit strange. I know Celtic fans do it all the time, but they ARE strange - and they mean the lyrics as they are indoctrinated into the bigotry. You sound like you mean them too. Away from football those songs are not my kind of music and I'm much more interested in other stuff.

I have question: is Neil Lennon really a Catholic - does he actually practice that religion? I really doubt it as he rarely acts anything like a Christian in the slightest. So my second question is: if he's not Catholic or of any other religion, how can any crime against him be religiously motivated - any more than a crime against Ali G is about him being black. I hate the way that a stupid, exceptional act of a couple of nutters is used as evidence that the rest of Scottish society is sick. If we're using such logic then it follows that we should shut down the Catholic church for being a paedophile ring... ie it's stupid and crazy. BTW People are forgetting that the IRA are mostly made up of Irish Catholics (and I think Celtic would be hurt if they weren't supporters of their team due to reciprocation) and there have been two bomb alerts recently. Does that mean that Irish people and the Catholic church are sick and should be investigated? Or is that somehow, "different". In fact, if Scotland is sick, what does that make the Republic of Ireland?