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Protest After Kilmarnock Game If Lennon Isn't Already Gone?


bazil85

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Well done Oaky for standing strong. It must have been a harrowing experience. FFS

That's a poor response.

There was absolutely no substance in your post, and Oaksoft has simply told it like it was.

Some of us never bought the Armageddon pish, and it seems that this has been more than vindicated, so your original point was spurious at best.

Anyway, we are veering off topic....

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That's a poor response.

There was absolutely no substance in your post, and Oaksoft has simply told it like it was.

Some of us never bought the Armageddon pish, and it seems that this has been more than vindicated, so your original point was spurious at best.

Anyway, we are veering off topic....

Some of us did buy into the armageddon pish for one good reason. We were looking across a boardroom table while SG asked us if we would be prepared to take a soft stance on Rangers if it meant people at our club keeping their jobs instead of losing them.

Faced with the thought of people like Norrie, Kath, Audrey and others being laid off, I was prepared to buy into the armageddon scenario.

Lies.

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Some of us did buy into the armageddon pish for one good reason. We were looking across a boardroom table while SG asked us if we would be prepared to take a soft stance on Rangers if it meant people at our club keeping their jobs instead of losing them.

Faced with the thought of people like Norrie, Kath, Audrey and others being laid off, I was prepared to buy into the armageddon scenario.

Lies.

I'm certainly not looking to take a self-congratulatory stance on this issue.

I opted not to buy into what most others did at the time, on the basis of taking the claims of SG and the other directors in good faith. That was my personal call, and others were entitled to form their own view also.

I won't, however, accept any suggestion that I was willing to see the club go into adminstration on the basis of some misplaced principle or irrational dislike of Sevco on my part. That is errant, and divisive twaddle. I simply wasn't hearing any compelling argument to back up the armageddon line.

A sense of vindication isn't the same as a 'told you so' attitude (I appreciate that you're not suggesting it is).

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Some of us did buy into the armageddon pish for one good reason. We were looking across a boardroom table while SG asked us if we would be prepared to take a soft stance on Rangers if it meant people at our club keeping their jobs instead of losing them.

Faced with the thought of people like Norrie, Kath, Audrey and others being laid off, I was prepared to buy into the armageddon scenario.

Lies.

Drew and I were the two at the meeting who said we wouldn't be back if Rangers were allowed to stay in the SPL. The rest, on a show of hands, voted that they would accept the club voting to save Rangers out of necessity. I didn't go into the stadium afterwards but the reports at the time suggested that the fans who were there that night did the same.

I can't claim though that I didn't buy into the "Armageddon pish". I did, I certainly thought there was a distinct possibility that several Scottish clubs could go into administration as a result and I certainly bought into the notion that there would be a need to cut back on staff. However the view I took was that if Scottish Football couldn't judge the Rangers situation with an even hand as to how Gretna and Airdrieonians had been dealt with, because of the money involved, then senior professional football in Scotland was dead anyway. So I guess I did do so on some "misplaced principle". Only I don't think it was misplaced in the slightest.

There were lies both on the night and in the immediate aftermath. I can forgive GIlmour, Campbell and McAusland for repeating the report from the SPL's accountants - the same ones who Gilmour said couldn't foresee Rangers going bust despite being in administration and despite being in full knowledge of the Ticketus deal and the then pending tax case. What I find much harder to forgive is the plea's from Stewart Gilmour for fans to leave SFL Chairmen to make up their own minds - whilst he lobbied them to vote to put Rangers into the Second tier - and then slated them for not voting his way after it was revealed that the SFL Chairmen weren't going to be bullied.

Edited by Stuart Dickson
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Drew and I were the two at the meeting who said we wouldn't be back if Rangers were allowed to stay in the SPL. The rest, on a show of hands, voted that they would accept the club voting to save Rangers out of necessity. I didn't go into the stadium afterwards but the reports at the time suggested that the fans who were there that night did the same.

I can't claim though that I didn't buy into the "Armageddon pish". I did, I certainly thought there was a distinct possibility that several Scottish clubs could go into administration as a result and I certainly bought into the notion that there would be a need to cut back on staff. However the view I took was that if Scottish Football couldn't judge the Rangers situation with an even hand as to how Gretna and Airdrieonians had been dealt with, because of the money involved, then senior professional football in Scotland was dead anyway. So I guess I did do so on some "misplaced principle". Only I don't think it was misplaced in the slightest.

There were lies both on the night and in the immediate aftermath. I can forgive GIlmour, Campbell and McAusland for repeating the report from the SPL's accountants - the same ones who Gilmour said couldn't foresee Rangers going bust despite being in administration and despite being in full knowledge of the Ticketus deal and the then pending tax case. What I find much harder to forgive is the plea's from Stewart Gilmour for fans to leave SFL Chairmen to make up their own minds - whilst he lobbied them to vote to put Rangers into the Second tier - and then slated them for not voting his way after it was revealed that the SFL Chairmen weren't going to be bullied.

In fairness, I was never 100% confident that the doomsday scenario was completely devoid of substance. I didn't have a crystal ball, so woudn't have been quite that arrogant as to suggest I knew for sure one way or t'other.

I was always very sceptical (at best) about the extent of the claims, and, like you, felt extremely uncomfortable with the options on the table regardless. On balance, it just didn't stack up, but maybe it was easy for me to not accept the BoD's line, as I wouldn't be the one laying off staff if they were right.

I don't think they (the BoD) argued their position with a great deal of conviction, to be honest. This was a further reason as to why I didn't really buy it.

Edited by Drew
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Every person in the boardroom and stadium that night took a view on matters based on the things they heard. Not one person was right, wrong, better or worse than anyone else - which is a point Drew and StuDick make, and they are correct.

I went in wanting to see Rangers fcuked over a barrel, but reluctantly changed my view purely on the prospect of good people within our club being the ones to pay the price of the massive reduction in income our club would face.

I still don't know how much of the armagddon shite was being given to us by SG, or how much of it was being passed on to us by SG who had been told it by Doncaster and Co at SPL Central Office.

Either way, none of them came away with any credit at the end of it all. Will be interestng to see how they handle 'Administration event 2, this time it's serious', should it happen again this week as predicted in some quarters.

I think I can smell some bullshit wafting our way already.

Edited by pozbaird
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I remember the emotional discussion about voting for staff to lose their jobs.

Under those circumstances remaining firm in opposition to the plans had to be about more than simply hating Rangers.

It had to be about facts and either instinct or trust where facts were absent.

Poz talks about trust being the deciding factor in the absence of facts which is fair enough.

I'm not about to call Gilmour a liar over the affair but something didn't feel right about it.

The deciding factor for me was the lack of financial evidence from Gilmour.

I strongly suspected that he actually had no idea what the SPL figures were because they weren't handng them out.

The SPL figures were in the hands of people like Doncaster and Lawell - neither of whom I trust to look after our clubs.

I felt (no conspiracy theories) that Lawell absolutely didn't want to see Rangers disappear and we've subseqently seen why if you look at their home crowds.

All in all I felt that Gilmour made a judgment error trusting guys like this and I'm pretty sure that under normal circumstances he'd have told them to piss of like most of the rest of us.

That is the reason I stayed firmly opposed to the plan.

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To be clear, I am not saying SG deliberately lied to supporters. I do not know however (as I said in a follow-up post) how much of the doomsday scenario actually came from him, or how much came from the wallopers at the very top of our game who may have fed guys like SG lies and mis-information.

I stand by using the word 'lies' though. Armageddon talk patently was lies - designed to bully and scare ordinary fans who wanted to see Rangers pay for their blatant cheating into softening their attitude to giving them an easy ride and keep them in the top flight.

Edited by pozbaird
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To be clear, I am not saying SG deliberately lied to supporters. I do not know however (as I said in a follow-up post) how much of the doomsday scenario actually came from him, or how much came from the wallopers at the very top of our game who may have fed guys like SG lies and mis-information.

I stand by using the word 'lies' though. Armageddon talk patently was lies - designed to bully and scare ordinary fans who wanted to see Rangers pay for their blatant cheating into softening their attitude to giving them an easy ride and keep them in the top flight.

Sadly, it is hard to escape the conclusion that the SPL chairmen were only too happy to accept Doncaster's lies and spin. If not, why didn't he get bagged when they had the opportunity. That there wasn't a vote of no confidence or some other form of decisive action to rid our game of that shyster following the Armageddon fiasco is on their watch.

Edit - I should perhaps be clear that I have no reason to suspect that the chairmen of the other clubs weren't acting in what they believed to be the best interests of their respective clubs, but the fact that Doncaster remains in the position he has is inexplicable to me after everything that happened. I'd love to hear one of them to explain the justification for this.

Edited by Drew
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Sadly, it is hard to escape the conclusion that the SPL chairmen were only too happy to accept Doncaster's lies and spin. If not, why didn't he get bagged when they had the opportunity. That there wasn't a vote of no confidence or some other form of decisive action to rid our game of that shyster following the Armageddon fiasco is on their watch.

Edit - I should perhaps be clear that I have no reason to suspect that the chairmen of the other clubs weren't acting in what they believed to be the best interests of their respective clubs, but the fact that Doncaster remains in the position he has is inexplicable to me after everything that happened. I'd love to hear one of them to explain the justification for this.

I think it was someone on P&B who posted the following.... Neil Doncaster's job interview for the SPFL gig:

Chairmen: 'So, Neil, tell us why you're the best man for the job'.

Doncaster: 'I'm not Stewart Regan'.

Chairmen: 'Fair enough, you can start on Monday'.

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