Why good governance in Scottish football isn’t a cinch

Nine years ago this summer, a clear message was sent out from those entrusted to run the national game in Fair Caledonia.

It did not matter that there had been a decade of cheating and the most egregious malfeasance in the Blue Room because when it came down to it, Rangers, a Rangers, indeed any Rangers at all was vital for Planet Fitba.

Although this front page in the Herald was factually correct, the men on the 6^th floor at Hampden had to find a way around it.

Plan A was to drop Sevco into the SPL and safeguard Old Firm Limited.

When that was scuppered by the season ticket rebellion from Aberdeen to Edinburgh, Plan B was required.

That meant inserting the new club into the second tier of the professional game in Scotland.

Thankfully we had the late great Turnbull Hutton acting with good authority on the steps of Hampden.

Mr Doncaster said on the record that “there is no mechanism for what we are trying to achieve”.

What these two fine chaps were trying to conjure a way out of the legal reality of liquidation was another Rangers in the topflight.

It just had to pretend to be the original club in order to groom and gaslight the grief-stricken Ibrox klanbase.

Of course, they had the succulent assistance of the illiterati on the sports desks to pull this off.

As the plan to drop Sevco Scotland into the SPL hung in the balance, dire predictions spoke of a “slow lingering death” for the national game.

Mr Regan even speculated darkly about “social unrest” if there was no Rangers at all.

Of course,  all of this pish about the vital requirement to have a Rangers was an intravenous injection of herrenvolk hubris into the Ibrox klanbase.

Charlie and the boys quickly realised the lay of the land and shovelled more of this shite into his bereft customers who didn’t want to believe what had happened when Hector had blocked the CVA.

After that, no one in a position of influence in this saga acted with good authority.

They all wanted to create space for pretend Rangers to access the klan pound.

Consequently, no one on Planet Fitba should be surprised at the latest outburst of Ibrox exceptionalism.

The spat over the new SPFL sponsor Cinch could become serious.

This morning I was sent this from someone who has a senior administrative role in a Scottish professional club:

Loss of cinch would cost each Premiership club between £360,000 and £1,072,000 over the next 5 years. That’s significant. You can be sure all 41 other clubs will be furious with Rangers if cinch were to pull out. Other Premiership club owners are in dialogue behind the scenes.

I made some routine inquiries with well-placed sources, and I was told that the company in question has some history as a business competitor with a senior person in the Sevco High Command.

The concept of the greater good does not seem to be understood in the Blue Room, apparently.

One very well-placed source told me last night that the SPFL’s lawyers have written to Sevco telling them to abide by the rules.

It was a tea spluttering moment in Dún na nGall!

Dear reader, in the summer of 2012, your humble correspondent flagged up the concept of moral hazard if the new Rangers were to be given a pass by the authorities and the local media.

Since then, the folks at Hampden have doubled down and how!

Allowing Mr David Cunningham King and his 41 criminal convictions for tax offences to sit in the big chair in the Blue Room merely underlined the central message that normal rules do not apply to anyone at Ibrox.

The concept of moral hazard is clear, i.e. if you do not penalise bad behaviour, you can expect more of it from the same source.

Sadly, the recidivists of Ibrox have little to worry about.