There is a reason that UEFA’s new Financial Sustainability Regulations (FSR) focus on wage costs.
That is because they are the best metric for predicting on-field success.
You could say that higher wages for the playing squad amount to a sporting advantage.
During the EBT decade, the original Rangers had a covert uplift to their wage bill by not paying all due taxes at the start of this millennium.
Of course, the UK Supreme Court finally ruled that wheeze offside in July 2017.
That legal ruling had the air of a post-mortem about it as the guilty club was already dead.
By June 2012, Rangers couldn’t pay their bills, and creditors rejected a CVA.
TERMINADO!
The folks in Nyon are concerned that in chasing success, clubs will overspend to the point past sustainability.
FSR is meant to prevent clubs from dying through liquidation.
That is why the current iteration of the Ibrox franchise needs to be mindful of FSR.
If they’re not, then UEFA has sanctions to assist them!
One of the Serious Professional’s last tasks was to get this message across to the brethren in the Sevco High Command.
My information is that most of them weren’t minded to really take it on board.
Since then, the Sevco wage bill has climbed to surpass that of the wealthiest club in Scotland.
This piece by Gary Keown for the Mail on Sunday states some inconvenient facts regarding the recent accounts published by Rangers International Football Club (RIFC).
After a week of pishful thinking about an “operating profit of £252k”, the reality of the £4.1m loss has been finally uttered in the mainstream,
Those year-end accounts contained the monies brought in by the sale of Joe Aribo and Calvin Bassey and revenues from the Champions League.
Yet they still posted a £4.1m loss!
Anyone who doesn’t think that’s a red flag isn’t paying attention.
Ah, bless…
I’m told that the Transcendental Chairman has recently remarked that they are indeed fortunate to have such a compliant media.
Notwithstanding Mr Keown’s atypical observations, that view has plenty of succulent evidence to support it.
A well-placed source has told me that Philippe Clement believes he will get substantial funds to strengthen in January.
That will undoubtedly be challenging for the Sevco High Command, especially as UEFA watches closely.
The task of the people in Nyon is to prevent another Ibrox club from dying of self-inflicted hubris.
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Are the sevco board actually looking for sanctions from UEFA, other teams seem to have received a ban on new transfers. That would suit the board, as they would be able to halt the spend, while deflecting blame onto UEFA and at the same time they would be able to feed the “everyone’s against us!” story line.
It’s quite possible that the January window could become pretty much irrelevant. Celtic have eleven games – two European games plus nine league fixtures, between this coming Saturday and the winter shut down, 38 days later. SIX of those nine are at home. They will rarely have a better opportunity to pick up 27 out of 27 points. Should they achieve that, they would be a MINIMUM of 11 points ahead of Sevco, albeit with a game more played.
Sevco have twelve games in 37 days, a punishing timetable that will test their squad to its limits. On paper their league schedule looks more difficult, but as we all know, football is not played on paper.
The coming six weeks will go a long way to deciding the title. Maximum points for Celtic and you can probably tie the green and white ribbons on the League Trophy. The window would, as I said at the start, be pretty much irrelevant.
If however, Sevco can match us, we have a serious fight on our hands, and the window COULD become crucial.
I doubt UEFA are watching at all otherwise they couldn’t be getting away with it again
Death does not seem to have any permanence for any form of Rangers. A stake through the heart is probably required. One thing is for sure. Sunlight won’t finish them. Their dark practices will never see the light of day. Their allies in the press and the SFA will make sure of that.
I’m at the stage where I think, what is the point.
Scottish Football is as corrupt and dirty as that last boxing farce we saw in Saudi with Fury v Ngannu.
It’s never, ever gonna change and that breaks my heart.
I get that the vast majority of the press support therangers but surely at some point in their heads they must think “I look a bit daft here”
Scotland’s shame indeed, oldco, newco, press and politicians…….real shame on you🫣
I’m in awe of you’re work Phil, please never stop🍀
Forget sanctions, let them die but no phoenix clubs allowed
That’ll stop the mad spending.
While clubs can die and ressurect with no implications then no sanction in the world will stop them committing financial suicide
I’m torn about UEFA: will they be happy to enforce FSR against a club outwith the big five leagues kr is FSR a lot of hot air ?
Another question is what sanctions would actually ne imposed ?
I don’t think they would initially be banned from UEFA competitions, although I hope I’m wrong.
As our Board won’t sanction any real spend on players who will put distance between Celtic and The Rangers, we could be faced with tge spectacle them winning the League and automatically qualifying for the Champions League while breaking FSR.
Why would you assume the club won’t sanction ‘real spend’? I assume you mean spending in the £6-9m range? It would strike me as odd that the club would go to great lengths to recruit a very specific elite manager, pay him far more than they’ve ever paid any predecessor then literally refuse to buy players in that range, having done so very often in recent years – on Edouard, Julian, Barkas, Ajeti, Carter-Vickers, Jota…
It seems much more likely that players in that range were approached but were unwilling to sign for the club this past summer (Saudi money quite possibly causing knock-on market flooding for sub-elite level players).
It might be reasonable to blame the club for having not yet developed a mature football development and recruitment policy, in line with equivalent European peers, but ‘won’t sanction’ just seems illogical.
I’d also speculate that Rangers might just be a perfect target for UEFA to enforce FSR with. A club big and well-known enough to send a warning shot to others with; less risky for them than targets in the top leagues. Like sacking a junior Brexit minister or something. Good headline; who cares…
I know what you mean regarding UEFA going after a big team outside the top five and hopefully you’re correct. My concern is that The Rangers will have already qualified for the Champions League by that point and breaking FSR in the process. So the money that they gain from the Champions League ensures they do not fail FSR.
As for our Board: they sanctioned money for Jota and Carter Vickers because they knew what they could do after a season with the club so they weren’t really buying unknown players. Edouard was the same although I believe the initial agreed fee was upped as ironically PSG had their own issues with FFP at the time.
All of those deals were done in the summer not January. How many times have we been told that no club wants to sell quality players in January ?
I remember hearing that after we sold Frimpong and El Hamid leaving us without a right back. The point being we sold two quality players but didn’t bring anyone in.
I really hope you are correct and reasonable money will be spent but I have my reservations.
I hear you and share a lot of the same fears, but I just think it’s much more likely, in context, that the club has been trying to sign players of that kind and that the players won’t come, than that they’re not making any effort to do so.
I’m not sure that the winter window is even a good one for us to go after players in that price range. You’d need to consider which players genuinely available to us in that range would be worth pursuing in that window (when they’ll be, say, £8m rather than £6m). Presumably players who have been injured or otherwise not playing for the selling club? Not great for the back half of the season. They need to be able to step off the plane and play, basically, and players who match that description generally don’t move in January (unless it’s a major step up career wise – and, again, that’s not usually the case when we sign players who meet that value).
For me though, if the club is not able to sign players genuinely valued in that range, we don’t really need to sign anyone else. We’re covered for good/solid £2-4m players.
Finally: the breakdown you give kind of backs up the strategy of loan to buy. CCV, Jota, Edouard – successes; Ajeti, Barkas, Jullien – less so (though that’s unfair on Jullien).
You may be correct. We certainly have been stung buying guys although it still rankles with me that Toney was in the building and had agreed to come only for us not to go another million and we ended up with Ajeti, a guy who had barely played in eighteen months. A bit like McGinn: another that got away.
We now have £72M in the bank. We’ve earmarked £15M-£20M for the Barrowfield upgrade although, as far as I know, the building of a small stand to accommodate fans for the women’s matches has been ditched so they won’t be playing there as per the original plans.
After that what do we spend the money on ?
We used to have £30M put away for failure to qualify for Champions League group stages, now we have £50M.
That seems to be the only thing keeping pace with inflation 😃
I’m not able to respond you your message, Justshatered, so I’m replying to my own (technically).
Those are all very good points.
The McGinn situation was clearly a joke in the end-up. The only context I’d add is from the time. I remember it unfolding. Hibs were asking for £3.5m that summer for a player who NO ONE else was interested in at the time and who was able to sign for free six months later. If you’re the only buyer in that scenario, you don’t spend money you don’t have to. Out of nowhere, Villa were bought by a Chinese corporation and swooped in late in the day.
But, for all that. If it’s a player the manager WANTS and who has been well scouted and analysed, you just pay the money.
I just mean that at that time it wasn’t that Celtic was unwilling to pay £3.5m in principle (they paid £9m for Edouard that month), it was just that a reasonable reading of the situation at the time was that Hibs were working a scam (it worked, it usually wouldn’t have).
Does that mean the 70000 seater stadium will be put on hold …………………….again 😜
Liquidation v2.0 approaches. The man from UEFA, he say Non.
What’s the old adage ? They rarely come back with very few exceptions ….
You only die twice!
Die Another Day.