Fans Board Statement re Llambias intention to disband it.

[ian1964 10,409]

Rangers are being run like Fawlty Towers, says Fans Board architect Rev Stuart MacQuarrie

 

BUNGLING Rangers directors were today accused of managing the Ibrox club the same way Basil Fawlty ran his TV hotel as arrangements for next month's EGM descended into farce.

 

 

 

The Glasgow club announced the general meeting would be staged in the Grange Tower Bridge

 

Hotel in London on March 4 in a statement to the AIM Stock Exchange yesterday morning.

 

The venue had to be changed after the Millennium Gloucester Hotel in Kensington pulled out last week amid fears about their guests being disrupted.

 

However, the Grange Tower Bridge Hotel did exactly the same thing just hours after it had been confirmed as the new location citing concerns for residents and staff.

 

And the SPFL Championship club revealed last night that the EGM called by shareholder Dave King would be held at Ibrox - where fans had wanted it to be from the start. The developments came after one of the official Rangers Fans Board predicted its members would be sacked and the body dissolved by the club - less than a year after it was set up.

 

The fans board angered the board by posting minutes of their meeting with chief executive Derek Llambias and director Barry Leach last week online without their permission.

 

Ethnic minorities representative Dr Zia wrote "this won't dampen our desire and motivation to get our club back from the clutches of the men who have blackened our name for the past three years".

 

Lifelong Rangers supporter Reverend Stuart MacQuarrie, who was instrumental in the setting up of the board, admitted he was saddened by events at the club he has followed for over 50 years.

 

And he compared the directors' handling of club affairs to 1970s sitcom icon Basil Fawlty running his shambolic guest house Fawlty Towers.

 

He said: "What is the club's business strategy? Blame your customers for everything seems to be the strategy at the moment.

 

"It is straight out of the Fawlty Towers book of management, in fact.

 

"The club is antagonising its customers. How do they bring in sponsors on the back of that? I am sure the current backers of the club are less than happy at what is happening."

 

Llambias revealed to the Rangers Fans Board that the EGM had been moved from Glasgow to London due to the behaviour of shareholders at the AGM in December. But Reverend MacQuarrie reckons the meeting should always have been held at the stadium and dismissed concerns about the crowd conduct.

 

He said: "It was a poor and sorry excuse. Ibrox is the most secure place. The EGM is only going to last for 15 or 20 minutes. Are the people who work at senior executive level at Rangers unable to last through 15 or 20 minutes of discomfort?

 

"The company was launched in Glasgow and its had its AGMs, some pretty stormy ones and some good ones, in various locations in the city.

 

"Is it a slight on the Scottish police force and the quality of the stewards who work at Ibrox? If it wasn't so serious it would be a comedy."

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http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/rangers/rangers-are-being-run-like-fawlty-towers-says-fans-board-architect-rev-197780n.118850570

[forlanssister 3,050]

Rangers are being run like Fawlty Towers, says Fans Board architect Rev Stuart MacQuarrie

 

We co-opted Stuart on to the RFB tonight.

[ian1964 10,409]

We've lost our faith in Ibrox board, says Church of Scotland minister who was architect of Rangers Fans Board

 

THE church minister who helped to set up the Rangers Fans Board has described the group's public bust-up with Ibrox directors as "concerning".

 

 

 

And he has labelled "unhealthy" the SPFL Championship club's hugely controversial business tie-up with Sports Direct magnate Mike Ashley.

 

Reverend Stuart MacQuarrie was delighted when he was asked to play a prominent role in the formation of the new body following the Ready To Listen survey last year.

 

The lifelong Gers fan, who conducted the services on the 40th anniversary of the Ibrox disaster and at the funerals of club greats Jim Baxter and Bobby Shearer, chaired the nominations committee.

 

The University of Glasgow chaplain helped to select supporters to represent a wide cross-section of fans - including ethnic minorities, families and the disabled.

 

So he was saddened when Rangers Fans Board member Dr Zia Islam posted on Facebook yesterday that the group was certain to be dissolved by the club that launched it, and its representatives sacked.

 

The Ibrox board was incensed when Rangers Fans Board posted online on Monday night minutes of its meeting at the stadium last week without the club board's permission.

 

Asked about the gradual breakdown in the relationship between the club and the new organisation, Rev MacQuarrie said: "It is a deep disappointment.

 

"I was just chairman of the nominations committee. But I was able to look at all of the applications personally and I attended the first couple of meetings.

 

"All the applications we received, not just those accepted, were from good Rangers supporters who wanted to help the club.

 

"A lot of work went into establishing the Rangers Fans Board - not just by me but by quite a number of other people.

 

"The fans offered themselves in good faith for service to the club they love. It is quite concerning if the Rangers Fans Board has to be dispensed with in this way - for expressing opinions.

 

"I thought they were very reasonable in the way they went about it. They consulted with the wider fanbase in an attempt to get elusive questions answered.

 

"Many people were wanting to ask those questions at the annual meeting and were prevented from doing so. They were dismissed and discarded at that meeting.

 

"The comments of the chairman David Somers at the annual meeting were appalling.

 

"I cannot think of a chairman of a company of the size of Rangers who has come away with comparable comments - except possibly Gerald Ratner, who described his company's products as rubbish. Nobody can behave like that.

 

"I think if the Rangers Fans Board is closed down or effectively neutralised then it does not bode well for the future of the club."

 

Rev MacQuarrie, who has been attending matches at Ibrox for more than 50 years, feels the influence of Newcastle United owner Ashley at Rangers is worrying.

 

He sensed a change in attitude towards Rangers Fans Board when former chief executive Graham Wallace was removed and Ashley associates Derek Llambias and Barry Leach came in.

 

He questioned how the club, which has agreed a potential £10 million loan with the enigmatic billionaire English businessman, is currently being run.

 

And he stressed to those involved in the running of the 54-time Scottish champions they need to involve their followers if they hope to reclaim former glories in the future.

 

He said: "Things changed when Graham Wallace ceased to be chief executive. Graham was very keen on the Rangers Fans Board.

 

"I think he felt very sincerely that it would be good to have a useful means of two-way communication with the fans. After he left, a different view was taken.

 

"It was the club that set up the Rangers Fans Board in response to interactions with the fans too. It was not the fans who called for it.

 

"Since there has been a change of personnel on the board and at senior executive level, the relationship with the Rangers Fans Board has changed."

 

REV MacQuarrie continued: "Football fans invest their money and much of their life in a football club.

 

"They deserve to be consulted over how it is run.That is certainly the way things

 

happen at football clubs up and down the country. Hopefully what you come up with is a merging of interests between the club owner and football fans.

 

"Football clubs are not a commodity that can be bought and sold on a whim. They cannot slot into a business strategy of some far-off owner.

 

"If an individual wants to run a business that way there are other companies you can invest in, where you are the principle shareholders, that you can run how you like.

 

"But it is different with football clubs and football fans. What has happened at Rangers is the customer base has been effectively undermined.

 

"I find it astonishing. It raises questions for me about the business strategy. Is it a case of the business being run down so that it becomes completely non-viable?

 

"Llambias has been quoted as saying he cannot understand the fans' hostility to Mike

 

Ashley given the fact that he is pouring millions of pounds into the club.

 

"Well, he is not. For every penny that he has put into Rangers he has made sure his own personal interests are looked after.

 

"What concerns me at Rangers at the moment is the dependency the club has on one individual.

 

"I do not regard any dependency as healthy."

 

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/rangers/weve-lost-our-faith-in-ibrox-board-says-church-of-scotland-minister-197758n.118817255

[aweebluesoandso 290]

This utter c@nt of a rat bast@rd Lambliar, is out to cause as much damage as he can to the club, before he booted down Edmiston drive imo.

[buster. 4,808]

 

-------------------------------------------

 

Well done to the RFB

Edited February 19, 2015 by buster.

[Frankie 8,146]

Ready to listen.

 

Unless we don't like what you say.

[Frankie 8,146]

Just thinking aloud but the RFB was directly associated to the membership scheme. Will those who paid £25 to have a vote/say in the RFB process be refunded?

[the gunslinger 3,366]

I doubt anyone did but if they did they must have grounds for a refund.

[BEARGER 1,829]

I doubt anyone did but if they did they must have grounds for a refund.

 

Anyone who did is due to lose the £25 for plain stupidity.

[Bluedell 5,329]

We co-opted Stuart on to the RFB tonight.

 

I don't think that's the best of ideas:

 

1. At the moment you're a group who have been elected by the fans. You now have a non-elected person and that severely dilutes the message.

 

2. You have co-opted the person who picked all of you for your short -lists. It can open up the idea of collusion and back-scratching.

 

3. Co-opting a person on the day that they appear in the press criticising the board suggests that you have an agenda, rather than a group of people who have reached your own independent opinion on the board.

 

4. You were a group of fans who were boldly standing up against the board against the odds. This makes it seem that you have a greater degree of independence and therefore lessens the message again.

 

I think the co-opting wasn't required, particularly at this point. Surely he could give advice from the background if that's what you wanted? I don't see any positives in this.