Keith Jackson: New Rangers board's financial credibility is on the line...

[ian1964 10,415]

...as delisting looms ever closer.

 

KEITH reckons Ibrox regime will suffer a massive loss of face if they are unable to get the club back on the Stock Exchange before Saturday's deadline.

 

THE newly instated regime at Rangers is already facing a race against time to protect their own credibility.

 

Directors Paul Murray, John Gilligan, Douglas Park and John Bennett have until Saturday not only to appoint a new nominated advisor, but also to convince the regulators of the AIM market this beaten-up business is in fact deserving of a second chance and readmission to the Stock Exchange.

 

Now this will not be at all easy, especially given that over this last year Rangers have the dubious honour of being tagged officially as the single most complained about company on AIM’s books.

 

There is a strong suspicion the top brass in the City are sick to the back teeth of this Ibrox odditorium.

 

That they have been embarrassed by it once too often and, having already suspended their shares, would rather wash their hands of it good.

 

Of course, Murray and his men cannot be blamed for any of this. On the contrary they have taken on the job of cleaning up the mess others have left behind in the board room and are discovering now the full extent of the toxicity of their predecessors.

 

They ought to consider ditching the standard issue blue blazers and brown brogues for a while because, while this process continues, they’d be better off in full-on chemical protection suits.

 

There seems no reason to doubt they are acting in good faith but they are also operating in a quagmire which has been created by all manner of chancers and charlatans over the last three years.

 

And yet the fact remains should they fail to deliver on either of the above then Rangers will be de-listed which is precisely the scenario the new board have been battling to avoid ever since being voted into office by shareholders on March 6.

 

While a delisting might not ultimately prove disastrous to their long-term plan of rebuilding a football club it would none-the-less come as an unwelcome blow to their hopes of restoring Rangers’ reputation and standing.

 

For that reason alone it’s a situation they would far rather avoid. But time is not on their side. Not only must they convince the market regulators that Dave King is a fit and proper candidate to run the club as chairman, in spite of all those tax convictions in South Africa, but they must reassure the men in London that Rangers are no longer going to be more bother than they are worth in order to have their suspension lifted.

 

And – largely because of the scorched earth policy implemented by the previous board in the last days of the Mike Ashley empire – they must do so before the City shuts down for the Easter holiday.

 

There would have been no need for such a rush job had WH Ireland, Rangers former Nomad, stuck to their promise to oversee an orderly handover to a new firm of financial experts.

 

Instead, on March 4, they pulled the rug out from under the feet of King and Murray by resigning from the position with immediate effect.

 

As far as King and his group were concerned this was a completely unexpected move. But it may not have come as such a shock to the likes of Derek Llambias and Barry Leach who, with just two days left before being wiped out at an EGM, were doing their best to booby-trap the boardroom as a welcoming present for the new board.

 

Somehow they managed to blow £300,000 on organising that shareholders vote and of course they also signed up a job lot of players on loan deals from Ashley’s Newcastle without stopping to think a medical or five might be required.

 

The serious health issues surrounding one of them, Gael Bigirimana , is another incendiary device that was left ticking in a corner of Murray Park.

 

But it was the resignation of WH Ireland that really set the clock racing because from the moment that bombshell went off, Rangers were tied in to the 30-day period that will end at close of business on Good Friday unless a time extension is granted over the bank holiday weekend.

 

King cannot play any part in this drama until such times as he is cleared to take on the chairmanship and that will also require a fit and proper pass from the SFA which, again, adds to the general picture of confusion behind the scenes.

 

This new board has taken on a great deal, perhaps even more than it realised, and the first three weeks in office have been quietly chaotic.

 

Not much has been said at all by the men in charge and even though interim chairman Murray spoke out through the club’s website on Friday in an attempt to fill the void the truth is he was able to say not much at all. It will probably remain so until the big issues of this week have been dealt with, one way or another.

 

That’s the problem with campaigning on a ticket of openness and transparency – saying nothing is simply not an option even when it’s a great deal easier to keep schtum.

 

As things stand, Murray has five days left to negotiate with both the authorities at Hampden and in the Square Mile and also to tie up the business of replacing the Rangers Nomad.

 

The biggest task of all might well be to convince the Stock Exchange there should be a place for this club to trade their shares on the market.

 

This is the job they signed up for when they said they wished to cleanse Rangers. Three weeks in, they’re going to need a bigger bath.

 

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/keith-jackson-new-rangers-boards-5426016

[Frankie 8,150]

Fair points from Jackson.

 

While the new board may not have known the scale of the task ahead, without proper communication of this, then they will hit problems with the fans. That's an issue ahead of renewals.

[calscot 0]

I can't quite see the portrayed AIM point of view. From where we've been standing they have been almost as inept and embarrassing as the last Rangers board in all this. Their own reputation is in doubt.

[der Berliner 3,247]

King said that delisting isn't that great an issue for him, more for investors like R&M ... though he would not delist out of respect for them, amongst other things.

 

New Rangers board's financial credibility is on the line...

 

We know how much they were willing to throw in, we know that Park, King and Letham* have enough money to help us out, that someone like Kennedy would come in and help too. We also know that a Sarver may look on too.

 

Obviously, King is hesitant to say too much about his own investment up until he's cleared as a director. Which will happen in early April. Cue a neat headline that wants to grab attention. It's not like King has said anything other than what is happening right now. I doubt anyone expected him to put 50m (or any other amount) on the table straight away and say: okay, let's get on from here! Murray filled us in with some info last week, Gilligan is talking to the support and McCall is doing his job as a manager. The support wants all things to happen ASAP and preferrably at once, but that was never going to happen. The King verdict will be the next milestone, delisting or not. After all, other shareholder can very well buy and sell their shares amongst one another still, can't they?

 

*Even Easdale has done so.

Edited March 30, 2015 by der Berliner

[Waltersgotstyle 297]

I will say it again - I really don't think we want to be re-listed. The LSE just encourages institutional investors - not the type of people we want controlling our club.

[Juancornetto 1]

AIM is the Rio Stakis of share trading full of basket case companies with dodgy investors and even dodgier lawyers. I'd be delighted to leave it behind and become a private company with a few institutional investors to retain some credibility for future activity.

[MoodyBlue 0]

The only ones who would have any kind of desire to have us listed would be our only real and proper institutional investor - Rive & Mercantile. But I'm sure there have been discussions with these guys which will hav led to some sort of compromise, amicably allowing the club to de-list at some point in the not too distant future. It's not King's intention to have us listed in the long term.

[simplythebest 0]

Does listing not also make the company much more accountable and allow more scrutiny?

 

Delisting being considered a viable better option has only come about pretty recently.

[forlanssister 3,050]

Does listing not also make the company much more accountable and allow more scrutiny?

 

Not really as was ably demonstrated by Green & Co.

[simplythebest 0]

Not really as was ably demonstrated by Green & Co.

 

I'm sure they aren't a prime example of how to be on the Stock Exchange.

 

Malcolm Murray seemed heavily in favour of listing and having credible institutions involved so its not like it was purely a Greenco gig.