No SFA action on Lawell comments

[Frankie 8,150]

http://www.scottishfa.co.uk/scottish_fa_news.cfm?page=2986&newsID=12878&newsCategoryID=1

 

Campbell Ogilvie, Scottish FA President: "This week, the Scottish FA’s Compliance Officer has reviewed comments made by the Celtic Chief Executive, Peter Lawwell, at the club’s Annual General Meeting, after receiving an official letter of complaint from Rangers Football Club.

 

"The Compliance Officer has informed both clubs that there is no actionable breach of the rules. None the less, I am compelled to convey my disappointment that we find ourselves in this position, as a result of an apparent erosion of mutual respect between two of our oldest rivals.

 

"At a time when Scottish football faces challenges on many fronts, it is incumbent on our biggest clubs to set the highest standards. In this regard both the comments made, and the subsequent time, effort and resource imposed on our Compliance Officer to deal with the complaint, were wholly unnecessary."

 

Not a surprise...

[Frankie 8,150]

What I will say though is that while the outcome was never in question, we have had a small victory here with Lawwell given a clear warning and the SFA again confirming our historic status.

[barca72 440]

He knows perfectly well our historical status. This is more about us drawing a line in the sand as to where enough is enough.

We have just received a put down from Ogilvie as if we were two kids in the playground misbehaving. He thinks we should not even bother his compliance officer with such trivial complaints, and has brushed this off as a joint misadventure.

To me, and for whatever reason he made it, Lawwell's remark is illustrative of how the whole cabal hold us in so little respect. Big Rod two years ago indicated the same when he screamed at a meeting that we had been cheating "them" for eleven years. How can we possibly feel that we are properly represented by the officers of the SFA when one of them feels that he can attack our brand with complete impunity.

I think Rangers should indicate their disappointment with the SFA's handling of this case and demand to know of Lunny which rules he feels were not broken. Does he not feel that an attack on a member club by an SFA officer does not fall under rule 66?

Rule 66: No recognised football body, club, official, Team Official or other member of Team Staff, player, referee, or other person under the jurisdiction of the Scottish FA shall bring the game into disrepute ...

It may be that Rangers should keep a ledger of complaints and present it to UEFA when we require intervention to get fair treatment from this biased SFA.

[ian1964 10,411]

It was a typical classless thing to say from a supposed high flyer in the game, and it did back fire somewhat,and he was only pandering to his hordes/BHEASTS,but it does highlight the total contempt in which we are held by all clubs and shows what is really wrong within Scottish football. Our time will come again.

[Ser Barristan Selmy 222]

What I will say though is that while the outcome was never in question, we have had a small victory here with Lawwell given a clear warning and the SFA again confirming our historic status.

Expecting the SFA to sanction Liewell would be like asking Mugabe not to rig his own election.

 

I see no victory here. The SFA can view us any which way they want, it won't change what is legally binding.

 

We are bigger than Scottish football and I only just wish we had the self respect to advance the club to the level it should be at. A club of our size should be aiming to reach the last 16 of the CL every year. But the sad truth is that when we are back at that level we will be playing 5 defenders against dross like the mhanks and Europa shite. No vision, no future basically. Just a club going in circles.

[MikeN63 0]

I read it as much about Rangers not complaining about trivia as it was telling lieswell to think before he opens his arse and starts talking shoite, but it is open to interpretation. probably written by lieswell PA anyway.

[andy steel 0]

I dunno, like I said in that other giant post I think the rest of the country and even the rest of football is pretty sick of listening to us and them bickering.

 

Given how classless they are on a predictable, weekly basis, there's an opening for us to act like adults and maybe stop pissing the rest of the country off. Can't see it happening though, it is football after all and I'd be a rank hypocrite if I pretended I was all mature when it comes to The Rangers.

[ian1964 10,411]

Comment: Outrage over Lawwell remark misplaced

 

CONSIDERING the lengthy series of misfortunes that have befallen The Rangers International Football Club plc since its incorporation just a year ago, its skeleton board of directors (a mere threesome before two recent additions) appears to have a rather skewed sense of what constitutes a priority.

 

Warnings of impending financial calamity, voiced by their own former chief executive, Craig Mather, to a fans’ group, the shying from involvement by another would-be redeemer, Dave King, and a looming, eventful and potentially harmful annual meeting of shareholders would all appear to this observer to be of much more concern than a brief comment made by the chief executive of Celtic.

 

In the land of the blue and the green, of course, there is no such thing as a throwaway line; at least, not until it has been chewed and spat out with wildly varying degrees of amusement and contempt, depending on the hue of the spectacles through which the “taster” views the world.

 

In the present climate at Ibrox, a fevered reaction among the club’s more hysterical followers to Peter Lawell’s response to a question from the floor during Celtic’s AGM could hardly be considered a surprise. Nor could the decision by the directors to make an official complaint in writing to the SFA over Lawwell, even if their action would strike anyone with a grown-up’s fully matured brain as laughable.

 

Those board members, after all, have been pre-occupied in recent times with the urgent need to insinuate themselves into the favour of anxious supporters who have been demonstrating an unambiguous hostility towards their style of corporate governance. Somebody must have persuaded them that “retaliating” against Lawwell would have the effect of a clarion call to the troops, although it would seem to any disinterested party to be a dangerously unreliable basis on which to presume the arrival of reinforcements on the eve of battle.

 

But the Rangers directors (and the fans) at least find themselves in fraught circumstances and, therefore, vulnerable to making errors of judgment. This is an understandable and entirely forgivable difficulty not shared by professional commentators. The most risible aspect of the entire Lawwell episode has been the moral outrage in certain areas of the media by some who should know at least the value of bringing proper consideration to an issue, as opposed to the impulsive reaction of a child too immature to recognise the difference between free-flowing emotion and rational thought.

 

The stampede to accuse the Celtic executive of “incendiary” and appallingly undignified behaviour made a telling contrast with the years of snide, sarcastic remarks directed at the Parkhead club by the former Rangers’ chairman, David Murray, and generally reported without a vestige of criticism. This obsequiousness was, of course, representative of the widespread media fawning afforded to Murray even as he drove Rangers towards financial devastation.

 

It was suggested in one piece that, had any other chief executive made Lawwell’s remark, it would have been immediately followed by a notice of complaint from Vincent Lunny, the Scottish FA’s compliance officer. This prompts the question: on what grounds?

 

When Lawwell was asked by a Celtic shareholder why the media continued to refer to Rangers, a club he insisted had been liquidated, the chief exec replied that “Rory Bremner can pretend to be Tony Blair”. No court in the land could prosecute a case in which an allegedly offensive – and punishable – comment made not a single mention of the party supposedly slandered.

 

Anyone interested in the business may construe Lawwell’s words as their prejudices dictate; the SFA, in the shape of Lunny, must construe them according to the rules. It is no surprise there will be no summons issued to Lawwell; not because of any special treatment, but because there is no case to answer.

 

http://www.scotsman.com/news/comment-outrage-over-lawwell-remark-misplaced-1-3199478

[Juancornetto 1]

If that doesn't get the author some Brownie points from Peter, nothing will. Crawling, sycophantic, spineless drivel.

[calscot 0]

Incredibly clear anti Rangers spin once again.