Eurosport article that leaves you speechless

[der Berliner 3,251]

Would Scotland miss Rangers?

 

By Eurosport | Desmond Kane â?? 12 hours ago (i.e. Fri, February 10th)

 

Of all the quotes that can be regurgitated relating to the darker side of Rangers and a helping of the imbeciles that have clamped themselves to the Glasgow club seemingly since time began, Ian Archer's musings remain perhaps the most pertinent. It was penned over 30 years ago. "This has to be said about Rangers, as a Scottish football club they are a permanent embarrassment and an occasional disgrace. This country would be a better place if Rangers did not exist," wrote Archer, who latterly worked on the now departed television programme Scotsport, in a Glasgow newspaper.

 

What was exceptional about Archer's heartfelt words is that they were scribbled down during some of the finer moments in Rangers' history, specifically alluding to a night when they snagged the old European Cup Winners' Cup in Barcelona in 1972 with a 3-2 victory over Dynamo Moscow. As a piece of newspaper prose, it was ahead of its time.

 

Inspired by beers and cheap wine while being firmly planted in Spain, a Roman Catholic country at odds with the anti-Catholic signing policy once employed by Rangers and endorsed by its supporters, a furious rump of followers battled with riot police in the Camp Nou amid their team's rise to clasp the only European trophy in the club's history.

 

It will be argued that the heavy-handedness of local police made the riots in Barcelona eminently preventable, but then Rangers seem to have spent large swathes of their past defending the extremist behaviour of those who masquerade as football fans. The blame always seems to fall on others.

 

In a taxing period when a case with HMRC threatens to capsize the club with over £50 million of debt, it is perhaps Karma as much as unpaid taxes and gross financial mismanagement that has left Rangers facing the trap door. Rangers may well be left to pay the price for the sins of the father, with or without his sash, and their inability to drive out the rancid element that has tailed them.

 

They range from their highly inflammatory position in shying away from signing Catholics, the racist and sectarian songs sung by some followers of the club, the orange shirts wheeled out a decade ago as a "Dutch tribute " marketing ploy and the wretched riots in Manchester when a big screen television went on the blink. These are just some of the episodes that have tarnished not only the Rangers brand, but the image of Scotland as a tolerant country.

 

Scottish football may be left impoverished by a league without Rangers, but will society? Should society feel a certain sadness towards the plight of Rangers?

 

While the Scottish Premier League, satellite television and perhaps even twitchy Celtic directors would lament the loss of the income that Rangers generate, a progressive Scotland may feel differently.

 

At a time when Scotland's first minister Alex Salmond is trying to drive forward the idea of an independent, progressive, multicultural, multi-faith Scotland - a rainbow nation of Scots - the country's national sport is perhaps the last public haunt for the miserably uneducated. This was seen and heard when Hearts and Celtic exchanged lamentable ditties on Wednesday evening that continues to illustrate the deep-seated anti-Catholic sentiment that exists in pockets of Scotland. The strained old IRA choruses were heard from the visiting end amid the pestilence. Tramps behave better.

 

Celtic supporters are plagued by their own unsavoury band, but have always been uncomfortable with the Old Firm tagline that they continue to share with Rangers. The racists who have used Rangers to further their warped ideology will remain intact, even if Ibrox does not after the tax hearing has been played out. This would be a tragedy for a club with so much potential.

 

For the decent Rangers fans, progressive people, who follow their club only as a football team, there is a genuine sympathy at how departed owner Sir David Murray allowed the club to fall into such a state, but there are too many who have been allowed to hijack the good name of Rangers to further their own ideals away from a sporting context. For them, there will be no sympathy.

 

Rangers may well survive in some form if they fall into administration, which would be heartening for the national sport, but would clubs outwith Glasgow such as Aberdeen, Hearts, Hibernian, Dundee United or Dundee be sorry to see them go?

 

To the ones who sing songs about child abuse and the Irish Potato Famine, it is difficult to argue that the air would not be cleaner if their club stops. "And because some people are so sick, I have to put six words at the end of this column," wrote Archer. "I am not a Roman Catholic."

 

Eurosport

 

Right time, right picture, right quotations ... from an anti-Rangers point of view.

 

I wonder whether Kane has anything to say about the behaviour of the Hooped Horrors, these last three years in particular?

[Frankie 8,151]

The RFC support has largely moved on from such chants - I can't remember the last time I heard either of them.

 

Probably the best deflection I've read in many years. Disgusting.

[aftershock 0]

This is getting out of hand. They can say anything they want about us, without any consequences. Makes me sick!

[Frankie 8,151]

Replied to the article:

 

I must say I'm astound at the content and timing of this article.

 

A few years ago, perhaps Mr Kane would have had a point. Rangers supporters did have a problem with less than inclusive songs and took their banter too far with the other examples the author highlighted. To that end they were regularly criticised in the media and also censured by UEFA.

 

For their part the vast majority of the RFC support faced down the challenge of removing these songs and did so almost overnight. The Billy Boys has not been sung for several years while The Famine Chant and BJK have not been heard for well over a season. Thus, rather than go over tedious old ground, maybe it would be more constructive to point out the positive news that these songs have all but disappeared?

 

Indeed, the more serious problem now lies with Celtic FC. As with RFC fans previously, this support have long sung offensive chants - be it 'political' nonsense about sectarian IRA murder gangs, ethnic cleansing songs about 'Soon there will be no Protestants at all' or plain old anti-British guff such as 'F**k the Queen' or 'Go Home British soldiers'; offensive songs are not unique to Rangers. Add in celebrating the Ibrox Disaster of 1971 and/or bigoted chants about huns (Scottish case law determines hun can often be a sectarian insult for Protestants) then it is clear Mr Kane's team of choice is a few years behind the Rangers support in eradicating 'illicit' songs.

 

Of course Celtic have also been punished by UEFA recently and if one adds in their ongoing hooliganism problems (fighting with police/stewards, stabbing each other and throwing of coins have all happened THIS season) then if the article author is so keen to get rid of Rangers, maybe the air will be even 'cleaner' if Celtic disappear too?

 

Finally, I'd also contend there would be much less of a tense atmosphere in Scotland without low-quality journalists who write the sort of aggressive, one-sided poison we've seen in this particular article. They do more than most to exacerbate a situation they claim they want removed. Shame on Eurosport for giving this particular writer a platform for his less than impartial commentary.

[bluebear54 0]

This deserves a well composed complaint to Kane's paymasters.

[der Berliner 3,251]

Sent this one a few minutes ago ...

 

Hello Eurosport / YahooSports,

 

This is a complaint with regard to the blog article "Would Scotland miss Rangers?" by Desmond Kane:

 

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/blogs/desmond-kane/scotland-miss-rangers-173834275.html

 

While there is a fair amount of upheaval at Ibrox and especially the press about Rangers' recent financial problems with the HMRC, the way the press has gone on with taking vicious attacks on all things Rangers becomes nigh embarrassing. The same holds true for this article by a Scotsman who has not only a well-known dislike for Rangers FC, but also quotes a well-known Rangers hater of the past in Ian Archer. To have somesuch published on an independent and hopefully objective website like that of Eurosport / YahooSports would be an embarrassment in itself, but the whole article is also construed out of facts not just dating back to an event 4 years ago (which was a very special case in many ways, strangely ignored by the author), but even to events 40 years ago, when the Rangers supporters' mindset was - indeed - very different from these days. But that was 40 (as in FORTY) years ago! The way the author presents it makes it seem that nothing has changed at all, which can be deemed to be a straight lie. Rangers draw support and players from all confessions, "races", you name it, without any problem at all. Some of their greatest stars of these last two decades have been Roman Catholics and exactly NOTHING was made of it. The only club that throughout these last three decades openly promoted its otherness in Scotland has been Glasgow Celtic FC ... and they do to this very day. This antagonizes them inside the country ... and not just with the Rangers support. It makes you wonder how weak the SFA/SPL appears to be when challenging this behaviour.

 

Yet, this is about Rangers and the way they are presented. The author states that there are songs being sung about "child abuse" and the Irish Potato Famine", which are both utterly false and misleading. First, the song about "child abuse" is cynical banter about a well-know Celtic and Scotland manager knowing and ignoring about the child abuse of a Celtic youth coach. They sing about the fact that this child abuse was swept under the carpet by Celtic FC and not being dealt with by "Big Jock" Stein. In fact, the Rangers support sing up very massively AGAINST child abuse, as well as Celtic.

As for the "Irish Potato Famine", this song has been proved long ago (not just now) to not targeting any victim of the Great Famine, but the Celtic support's "Would-be-Irishness" as well as "Anti-Britishness", evident everywhere they go and play. This has nothing to do with the Irish, nor a racism so poorly insinuated by Desmond Kane. That behaviour by the Celtic support can be seen in various samples on here, samples that shame not only the name of the game, but also that of Scottish football more than any so-called "sectarianism" (a word that desperately needs a new definition, since it is massively abused by the Scottish media and authorities):

 

http://doublestandards.bplaced.net/index.html

 

Of course, I did not even touch the actual question posed by the article, "Would Scotland miss Rangers?". For Desmond Kane nigh solely goes on about "sectarianism" (of the past, as I stated) and some violence not specifically to the Rangers support either, but actually fails to mention the status of Rangers in the Scottish game. The status as one of the two clubs who generated most income of all things SPL and SFA, be that club revenue, TV income or drawing support. Instead, he goes on about dragging a "sectrarian" element out of the locker of history and presents it as prevailing in the modern day Rangers support.

 

Such sort of journalism is not exactly up the standards of Eurosport and YahooSport.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

 

NB: While a feedback of the author is welcomed, it should be pointed out that this is a complaint to YahooSports / Eurosport itself, since it is the latter who allowed such one-sided reporting to be attaced to their name and brand.

[der Berliner 3,251]

Frankie, did you get a auto-response into your e-mail account? Not sure whether my complaint was send, since the "share your feedback" screen reappeared with no note of the complaint being sent.

[Jim1955 12]

Thanks guys, that needed a quick and accurate response. We need to be more proactive in these matters.

[Frankie 8,151]

Frankie, did you get a auto-response into your e-mail account? Not sure whether my complaint was send, since the "share your feedback" screen reappeared with no note of the complaint being sent.

 

I didn't email anything mate - it was a just a reply to the article.

 

I'll send an email next week.

[Frankie 8,151]

Hmm, they don't seem to want to publish my comment.