Leggat - THE BLUE PITCH AND MARGARITA MYSTERY CONTINUES

[ian1964 10,415]

It was only fit and proper that Paul Murray should have once again have raised the issue of who it is who really owns a large chunk of Rangers.

 

For without knowing who they are, there is no way of knowing what their motivation in investing in Rangers was and what their intentions are.

 

The two major players who continue to hide behind a cloak of anonymity, who keep cowering behind collective names and who operate in the shadows without any clarity are Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita Funds Holding Trust, who, between them own more than 10 per cent of Rangers.

 

As things stand the combined Blue Pitch Holdings and Margarita stake in Rangers are votes in the bank for chief executive Craig Mather and financial director Brian Stockbridge as they fight to keep their well paid jobs.

 

The assumption must therefore be that Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita are pleased with the way the board’s only two executive directors – particularly financial director Stockbridge – are doing business inside the Rangers boardroom on behalf of their investment.

 

That, despite the fact last month Stockbridge was stampeded into going public with an admission that, of the money from two years of season ticket sales, plus various other substantial income streams over the past year, along with the £22.5M from the share issue in December, only £10M remained.

 

The current Rangers directors have been keen to get to the bottom of who it is who is behind the Jim McColl-Paul Murray led moves by concerned institutional investors from the Square Mile to unseat them at next month’s Annual General Meeting and they have had them jump through hoops.

 

However, McColl and Murray have been happy to do so. For they are businessmen of absolute acumen, complete probity and reputation. People, just like those institutional investors, with nothing to hide.

 

On the other hand, the Rangers directors have continually refused to reveal to the rest of the club’s shareholders, including those Square Mile institutional investors who are dissatisfied with the way they are running Rangers, just who it is who is behind Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita.

 

Why? If they have nothing to hide, why are they hiding it? If the shadowy people who lurk behind Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita have nothing to hide why do they continue to hide?

 

A year ago the man who was then the main representative on the Rangers board of Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita, former chief executive Charles Green, denied that Arif Naqvi of Abraaj Capital, was the man behind Blue Pitch Holdings. Green, however, tellingly admitted that Naqvi was a personal friend and that he had approached him to become involved in Rangers, but that he had not invested.

 

Green then named Mazen Houssani as the front man for Blue Pitch Holdings. But then again, as we know from many of his pronouncements - Dallas Cowboys and Manchester United, anyone? – Charles Green says more than his prayers.

 

Something else which Charles Green said, was that the Scottish Football Association were made aware of who all the beneficial owners of Rangers were at the time of them granting Rangers a licence to play.

 

Perhaps there may be some legal option open to Jim McColl and Paul Murray to get a sight of the list Charles Green says he gave to the SFA.

 

Or, perhaps the SFA, in the interests of honesty and openness and in the interest of a founding member club’s safety and continued good financial health, may feel they should take the bold step of revealing who all of the beneficial owners of Rangers are.

 

For as things stand, the men inside the Rangers boardroom seem hell bent on ensuring that the rest of the club’s shareholders cannot decide for themselves just why two far eastern based, seemingly shadowy organisations, should want to invest substantial sums in Rangers when it is almost certain there is no opportunity for their investment to provide any substantial profit.

 

Therefore, if making a substantial profit is not the motive for the Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita investment, just what is their motive?

 

That is the question which should be troubling and exercising the minds of all of the other Rangers shareholders, individual fans, supporters organisations, others such as Mike Ashley and institutional investors alike.

 

At the moment, the only way of getting to the bottom of what may give the appearance of being the sinister purposes of the Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita investment in Rangers, is for the current two executive directors to be voted off the Rangers board at the Annual General Meeting and men who will get to the bottom of this sordid seeming tale and who will unmask who is behind Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita Funds Holding Trust, voted on.

[the gunslinger 3,366]

i suspect we won't be told.

 

it is good that people are asking at least.

 

for all we know they are whyte or ticketus or similar. while they refuse to tell us it's hard not to be suspicious and worry about their motivations.

 

especially given the actions of the boaRD THEY HAVE PUT IN PLACE.

[ranger_syntax 3,769]

I'm almost certainly guilty of lacking imagination here.

 

Can anyone explain why the identities of the people behind Blue Pitch et al are important?

 

I could understand that if it turned out that Craig Whyte was involved that it would be a problem. Other than him what is important about this?

[Crimson Dynamo 128]

Did the Charlotte Fakes thing not produce a letter or something saying that Green hadn't told the SFA? I think it said he'd told them SFA ha!

 

Anyway I'm sure it was in the exchange about whether or not Whyte was involved with the consortium could be wrong though

[the gunslinger 3,366]

I'm almost certainly guilty of lacking imagination here.

 

Can anyone explain why the identities of the people behind Blue Pitch et al are important?

 

I could understand that if it turned out that Craig Whyte was involved that it would be a problem. Other than him what is important about this?

 

we don't know it's not whyte.

 

it could be someone even more dangerous.

 

we just don't know. thats the problem.

[RANGERRAB 3,258]

we don't know it's not whyte.

 

it could be someone even more dangerous.

 

we just don't know. thats the problem.

 

I genuinely don't believe Whyte has anything to do with Rangers. To me he is simply a Walter Mitty type character. How many of his so-called businesses are actually trading & making money?

His lifestyle is under investigation no doubt as he appears to have no obvious amounts of income to support homes in monaco, london and the highland castle which looks like being repossessed.

That said I would like to know who is behind BPH & Margarita holdings & their motives for doing so.

[the gunslinger 3,366]

I genuinely don't believe Whyte has anything to do with Rangers. To me he is simply a Walter Mitty type character. How many of his so-called businesses are actually trading & making money?

His lifestyle is under investigation no doubt as he appears to have no obvious amounts of income to support homes in monaco, london and the highland castle which looks like being repossessed.

That said I would like to know who is behind BPH & Margarita holdings & their motives for doing so.

 

 

far more likely it's ticketus than whyte imho.

[ranger_syntax 3,769]

It could be someone even more dangerous.

 

far more likely it's ticketus than whyte imho.

 

What would be more dangerous?

 

Why would Ticketus be involved and would that be more problematic than anyone else?

[BrahimHemdani 1]

This is yet another article of no substance whatsoever from Leggat.

 

He might as well have written one line saying - "I don't know who's behind BPH and Margarita Trust".

 

There is no evidence, at least none that he has adduced in this article, to substantiate his claim that "a substantial profit is not the motive for the Blue Pitch Holding and Margarita investment". It may well be that Green convinced them (and others such as Artemis) that there was indeed good reason to think that a substantial profit could be made in a relatively short period of time (3-5 years).

 

They are under no obligation, moral or otherwise to reveal the names of their investors, so why should they; just because we want to know. I am not taking sides here, I'd like to know the identity of all major shareholders in Rangers, all I am saying is that the fact that they don't want to reveal themselves doesn't make them bad guys any more than Frank Blin not wanting to say why he stepped down, makes him a bad guy. And of course, the requsitionists may have satisfied the Board's demands but they haven't publicly revealed the benefical owners of their shares either; so are they bad guys too?

 

BTW rather than looking a long way back to the thread about the Murray letter to the SFA, since the SFA have been mentioned here, I did put that to Stewart Regan and he did reply after he came back from holiday to say that "We have chosen not to engage with the anonymous person involved in this Twitter account. We are unsure as to whether information accessed and published has been done so legally. I am not prepared to comment on the content or authenticity of the material."

 

(If the admins can find the relevant thread and resart it or add that comment, if appropriate, that's fine by me.)

 

However, based on what he said in response that matter I think you can take it that the SFA will not reveal any information that they are not obliged to reveal and frankly it's a ludicrous suggestion by Leggat in any event.

 

The SFA know only to well that they screwed up the Whyte situation and my feeling is that the less they have to do with the machinations of the Rangers Boardroom the better from their point of view. I am quite sure they are shitting themselves at the prospect of Sandy Easdale being appointed a plc Board director.

Edited September 27, 2013 by BrahimHemdani