REPORTS of "Armageddon" - the end of Scottish football in the wake of the liquidation of Oldco Rangers - have indeed proved premature. The re-birth of Newco Rangers is, of course, an interesting side show; the real story is the way Celtic has, as yet, failed to roll over all opposition. Those who forecast the SPL would be over by Christmas have been proved wrong.
It has nearly always been the case in Scotland that, when one or other of the Old Firm clubs has a bad spell, the other half drops unexpected points and one or two other clubd emerge from the pack to challenge.
What many people seem to forget is, Neil Lennon is working with quite a young squad, one which is still - a work in progress. I will still be absolutely amazed if Celtic does not win the SPL with something to spare, but, right now, their inconsistency is making for a interesting campaign - let's home the interest can be maintained.
AS I have been saying for months, the whole Rangers "thing" - EBTs, double contracts, Craig Whyte, Ticketus, HMRC, did they cheat? To what extent did they cheat, if they did? - will take ages and ages to sort out. I assume it will be - some day.
I remain more than ever sure that the only winners will be the massed ranks of the corporate and tax lawyers who are gathering around the carcass of the old club.
I can still see some of the old Rangers' SPL titles being taken away from them. However, I cannot see these titles being re-assigned to Celtic, much as some of the wilder elements in the Celtic Family might wish this.
From what we know, so far, there is cause to believe that certain Rangers players had "double contracts" or "side letters", which might not have been legal under SPL rules.
However, I would suggest that, since the purpose of these dcs or sls was to allow the players involved to keep a bit more of their wages, they would in all probability still have played for Rangers without them - some other method of tax avoidance would probably have been used.
Therefore, Rangers won their titles fair and square on the field, so, if the sanction(s) put in place for any illegal dcs or sls include the loss of titles, the titles cannot be re-assigned elsewhere.
"Financial doping" isn't like regular sports doping through the use of performance-enhancing drugs. You can strip an Olympic title from somebody proved to have used drugs - you cannot strip a league title from a club whose payroll administration processes were dubious - since the same players would have played anyway.
But, if you think what has transpired so-far has been a huge stair-heid row - well, once the SPL tribunal reports - you aint seen nuttin yet.
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