Full Explanation Of New League Of Nations - Aye Right.

I RETURN today to the newly-announced UEFA League of Nations (let's hope it doesn't reduce itself to the level of imp0tency of its ill-starred 1920s predecessor of the same name).

 

I have had a look at the "full explanation" as laid-out on the official UEFA website; the devil is in what is not explained therein. UEFA stresses the new competition will not, unlike the Champions League, be an excuse for the rich to get richer, I don't believe them.

 

In principle, the idea is a good one, offering more-meaningful non-qualifying internationals, rather than meaningless friendlies, although, these are still on-offer, particularly for the bigger nations. Cannot have a system whereby England, Germany, Spain and Italy cannot fit-in friendlies with the likes of Argentina and Brazil.

 

Were the new competition to be introduced today, Scotland would be in the second of the four new divisions. Taking the current UEFA international co-efficients as a guide, Division Two would be filled by: Czech Republic, Romania, Israel, Cyprus, Denmark, Croatia, Poland, Belarus, Scotland, Sweden, Bulgaria, Norway, Serbia and Hungary.

 

Just how these 14 nations, currently ranked 15th to 28th in the UEFA rankings, would be split into their groups within the division, is unclear. These 14 nations will be split into four mini-leagues, with the four mini-league winners then playing-off for the play-off places for Euro2020 and subsequent competitions.

 

IF the mini-leagues are formed on regional lines, Scotland would be in against Denmark, Sweden and Norway at least; if, however, the initial sorting-out was done by taking the co-efficient order and going, one, two, three, four, we would be in with Czech Republic, Denmark and Serbia. That, however, is simply guesswork, based on my reading of some fairly scanty data.

 

Either one of my imagined groups would be a tough one to win,  but, it wouldn't, I suggest, be beyond us. Certainly, such groupings would offer games which would excite the Tartan Army a bit more than some recent friendlies.

 

Also, of course, there is the belief that Scotland has never really done friendlies and needs to know a match is meaningful, before our guys give it 100 per cent.

 

It has taken UEFA from 2011 to get this far, the new competition will not kick-off before 2018, so, there is plenty of time for UEFA to get it right. Let's hope they can.

SO, Black Sabbath didn't turn out to be thus for the long-suffering Hearts support; but, their recent pain continues for the Hibbees across the city. It was always, given Hibs' recent form, a reasonable bet that Hearts might win. They will still be relegated, but, now the calamity for capital football of a double relegation is all too real.

Squeaky bum time in Edinburgh right enough.

And, just to dampen the enthusiasm around Gorgie, the latest news from Lithuania may well cause a few sleepless nights for the faithful.

That All-Ayrshire Junior Cup Final Is Still On - But, Don't Take It As Read

REAL fitba first today, and last night's semi-final draw for the Scottish Junior Cup. Down here in God's Orange County, the natives are getting a wee bit restless, with, potentially an all-Ayrshire semi-final line-up - the draw being: Camelon or Whitletts Victoria v Glenafton Athletic and Hurlford United v Irvine Meadow or Bo'ness United.

 

Hopefully the last four will be known by tomorrow night, and while it would be a terrific boost for the blood, sweat and tears which Chairman John Dalton and his back-room team have put into in keeping Whitletts alive and getting them to this stage, reality suggests Camelon will be the end of a long and exciting road for Ayr's other fitba team.

 

The other quarter-final tie to be played tomorrow is potentially a cracker. Bo'ness have already done the hardest bit of winning the Junior Cup, they got rid of Auchinleck Talbot and, in this competition, when you beat the best, it would be downright careless not to go on and win the trophy.

 

However, the Meadow will not be easily "mown". The club has never quite got back to the level it played at during Bob Alexander's tenure as match secretary all those years ago, indeed, the consensus in Ayrshire is that the Medda's followers guid conceit o' themselves has, over the past several years, not been matched by deeds on the park.

 

Fifty years ago, the Meadow and Glenafton were the Kings of Ayrshire Junior Football, so, it would be good to see them contesting a Rugby Park final on 25 May.

 

What might not be so good, would be a Glenafton v Hurlford United show-down. Let's just say, the manner in which Darren Henderson left Loch Park to take over United at Blair Park, has not been forgotten in New Cumnock. IF it came down to a Glen v Hurlford final, 20-years after the notorious "Shame Game", when Glens and Largs staged an unarmed combat spectacular posing as a football match at Ibrox, the gloves just might be off again.

 

 

 

AND SO, that soap opera - 'Edmiston Drive' soldiers on. It is difficult to even comment on the hullabaloo surrounding the Rangers' tribute act any longer, other than to say: is there no way the SFA and the SPFL can knock heads together and bring some type of order to a seemingly endless situation which brings football into disrepute.

 

It is time the rest of Scottish football decided, once and for all - either the Rangers "brand" is too-big-to-fail, too-important to Scottish football OR they decide, this is just another club which should, if its management cannot act with propriety and run it properly, should be allowed to die - again.

 

 

 

 

Well Done Celtic - You Can Only Beat What's In Front Of You

TODAY'S post must kick-off with congratulations to Celtic, for winning the Scottish Premiership title with seven fixtures still to play - the earliest the top league title has been won since 1929.

 

We accept that on the wilder fringes of that strange planet inhabited by the tribe known as: Ra Peepul, this 45th title will be greeted with something between feigned indifference and outright hatred; we will be assured by the orange and blue tinted cyber warriors, this title is somehow "tainted". One can only pity these poor creatures, crying as they are in the wilderness.

 

It is no fault of Celtic that the other 11 teams in the Premiership are unable to mount a sustained challenge to them. Yes, Celtic, through historical reasons, the financial clout which their presence in the Champions League and their huge following gives them, have a huge fiscal advantage over their rivals.

 

It is regretable that, rather than recruiting and nurturing good, young, Scottish players, Celtic have chosen to recruit and nurture mainly "cheap" non-Scottish imports. However, it is even more-regretable that the other 11 clubs have either aped this approach, but, through lack of money etc, have sometimes chosen to recruit even-cheaper non-Scots, or, have failed to heed what I call the Avis option.

 

To explain, this is a reference to the old Avis Rent-a-Car advert, in which the company insisted that, since they weren't as big a company as main rivals Hertz, they had to try and work harder to compete.

 

I would like to think that, for season 2014-15, the other 11 will indeed, adopt the Avis approach, work harder and by so doing, make it harder for Celtic to defend their latest title. Such an approach would make for a much brighter future for Scottish football.

 

 

 

JUST a wee thought which was dredged-up this week during a conversation with a Hibs-supporting pal, who reckons it might make sense for Terry Butcher and his team to go flat-out to get into the relegation/promotion play-off between the Premiership and Championship at the end of this season - then lose and get relegated.

 

Playing in next season's Championship, against Hearts, Rangers (assuming there isn't another administration/liquidation scenario for either or both before then), Dunfermline, Falkirk etc, would, so the theory goes, offer a bit more income - near-full houses at Easter Road against the Sons and Cousins of William, plus improved crowds to watch a team playing at the top rather than bottom end of the league, plus, be a better place in which Terry Butcher and Maurice Malpas could carry-out the necessary restorative surgery.

 

That's the theory anyway.

 

 

 

MENTION of Ra Peepul brings me to today's latest financial news from what some of the Celtic Family, with justifiable humour, are referring to as "Ibrokes".

 

Over-spending, living way beyond their means was perhaps the main reason for the travails which brought down the Murray incarnation of the Rangers' brand - and opened the door to the almost-criminal mis-management of the Whyte era, then the rampant shenanignans of Charles Green and his successors/associates.

 

It appears that CEO Wallace is attempting, at long last, to bring a touch of reality and fiscal good governance to the club, but, just as another Wallace, all these centuries ago, was under-mined and eventually undone by jealous nobles, it could be that what Wallace has to say at the end of his 120-day review, will not be listened-to by his audience.

 

The figures tell us - Rangers have been losing money at the rate of around £1.5 million per month. There are caveats in place, the effect that the rate of losses are slowing - but, there is a difference between slowing the rate of losses and turning a profit.

 

Without profits, Rangers will not return to the one-time state of Scottish football being a two-horse race and, with no other horse training-on to challenge the current champions, there is nothing but a cold dark future for the game up here.

 

And, by the way, when is somebody going to call the man who would be King's bluff.

 

The Bunnet used to say, regularly, that a lot of people in Scottish football needed a reality check. Today, that statement is still good, but, a lot of people around Ra Peepul's club, need this reality check more than most.

 

The Bunnet didn't like doing it, but, he was forced to pay-off the Four Families, before he could turn Celtic around. The reality is, either a one-Rangers' Man-band, or a consortium of well-heeled members of the former Rangers' corporate insiders club - the Wee Arra People, will need to arise and buy-out the guys who currently run the club.

 

Then, if rumours are correct, they will need to find more money to buy the deeds to Ibrox and Murray Park back from Charlie Green, Craig Whyte, David Murray or whoever holds these.

 

And, if there is one thing recent history tells us - there are quite a few people who are more-willing to parade their credentials as: "A True Rangers' Man" than to parade their credentials as someone prepared to put real money into the club to turn it around rather than simply turn a profit.

 

 

 

FINALLY - while I welcome the newly-proposed UEFA League of Nations, which will apparently replace international "friendlies" or "challenge matches" - the devil will probably be in the detail.

 

I will refrain from posting on this subject, until I have read through the proposals line-by-line. Given UEFA's track record, this may well be a means of making the big European nations such as England, Germany, Italy and Spain bigger and richer rather than helping wee nations like Scotland compete better.

 

  

Packing Them In

IN recent years, following the well-documented travails of clubs such as Dundee, Motherwell, Dunfermline Athletic, Hearts, Rangers, Kilmarnock and so on, there has been much talk around Scottish football concerning fans buy-outs and ownership of clubs; of making the local football club an essential part of the community.

There have been a couple of sugestions of a community buy-out of St Mirren, but, to date, nothing.

Well, across the Atlantic, the town of Green Bay, Wisconsin, which is roughly the same size as Paisley, is the home of perhaps the most-successful, community-owned club in all of sport - the Green Bay Packers.

I recently came across an article which describes how the Packers came to be owned by the fans, and what it means. Of course, British and American laws and sporting ethos are not the same, but, this article shows what can be done in the good ol' U S of A, and could surely, one hopes, in somewhat tinkered-with form, be done over here.

The Green Bay Packers are a historical, cultural, and geographical anomaly, a publicly traded corporation in a league that doesn’t allow them, an immensely profitable company whose shareholders are forbidden by the corporate bylaws to receive a penny of that profit, a franchise that has flourished despite being in the smallest market in the NFL—with a population of 102,000.

The Packers have managed not merely to survive but to become the NFL’s dominant organization, named by ESPN in 2011 as the best franchise in all of sports.

The Packers have sold out 295 consecutive home games, and there are 80,000 names on the

waiting list for season tickets. Green Bay residents consider it a point of pride to buy their own bodyweight annually in Packers paraphernalia. The Packers led the NFL in apparel sales last year making $27 million just through the pro shop inside Lambeau Field and the site Packers.com. All that swag, and those endless sellouts, made the Packers the 11th-highest-revenue team in the NFL in 2011, with total income of over $280 million, despite the fact that it plays in by far the smallest of the league’s 32 cities. (Ironically, this success means that Green Bay pays into the NFL reserve fund set up to redistribute revenue from larger market teams to smaller market teams.)

When you talk to Packer management, you start to realize that success is a tribute to the careful, constant maintenance of two things: the product on the field and the community’s warm feelings about that product. The team has a special place in this community. It is owned by this community.

The Packers must constantly walk that fine line between profitability and community. Every other NFL franchise is controlled or entirely owned by one majority shareholder, and NFL rules prohibit otherwise. (The Packers’ ownership structure predates current NFL rules.) Ticket prices, concessions, parking, stadium naming rights—all of that is dictated at most NFL stadiums by whatever the owner feels the market will bear, and every additional dollar is profit into the owner’s pockets.

The Packers don’t operate like that. Take ticket prices: Even after a 9 percent bump this Super Bowl championship year, the highest-priced ticket is $83, lower than all but two other franchises.

“We work as hard as anyone to increase revenue, to decrease costs. But we also judge our success by how we are regarded in the community,” says Jason Wied, the team’s vice-president of administration and general counsel. “We could probably double home game revenue if we charged New England Patriot prices, but we have to think of our blue-collar base.”

Wied is typical of those near the top of the Packer organization. As a child growing up in Green Bay, he was one of the kids who brought his bike to practice every day in the hopes a player would ride it back to the locker room, a quirky local tradition that cements the bond between community and team. He stayed in Wisconsin for college and law school before coming to work for the Pack. “Our job,” says Wied, “is to sustain this organization into the next generation. To make sure the Packers stay in Green Bay. From time to time we make decisions that may not be in our best interest but are in the best interests of the community.”

More often than not, those interests are the same. Although the Packers were founded in 1919 by local high school football star Curly Lambeau, it was the team’s articles of incorporation from 1923, based on a now-defunct Wisconsin non-profit tax status, that instituted the basic structure. It includes a provision that if the team were sold or moved, the proceeds should go to a local American Legion post. (That was changed in 1997 so the beneficiary would be the Green Bay Packers Foundation, a charitable trust.) Subsequent stock offerings in 1950 and 1997 reauthorized the ownership principles, which would make any modern-day CEO giddy at the operational freedom.

The 112,158 Green Bay Packers Inc. shareholders are entitled to no profits or dividends and cannot sell, assign, or transfer a share to a third party. In other words, Packers shares are permanently worthless. “If you’re a Green Bay person, well, you just see this as a way of supporting the team,” says Bea Froelich, 72, who owns two shares, one of which is framed on her stairwell.

Owning a share entitles you to show up once a year to approve a slate of directors. Prospective candidates for the board are invited by existing board members, with the nods usually given to prominent local businessmen and community notables. “It’s such an honor when they ask you to join the board,” says Peter M. Platten III, a former vice-president of the Packers and CEO of Valley Bancorporation. “We all grew up here with this team, so when they ask, you feel like you’ve been recognized.”

The board in turn elects the executive committee, which makes the important business decisions about running the organization. The biggest is who should be CEO of the Packers—the role that for every other franchise is played by its owner.

Nothing like the Packers can happen again. The NFL’s ownership rules forbid the model of public shareholders; the NFL’s goal is to ensure that clubs have a single owner with financial resources and management accountability.

Ultimately, the Packers are able to thrive in ways others cannot because the team is a cultural icon—a symbol of America’s love of the underdog who over performs. The intensity of feeling at Lambeau every home game is common to only a handful of other pro sports venues in the country—Fenway Park before a playoff game might come closest. There is the game on the field, and then there is the sense of those 60,000 in attendance that they are involved in something bigger than the sport; they’re honouring a compact.

As he paces the sidelines before the kickoff, Chief Executive Officer Mark Murphy is mindful of that heritage, that special bond between team and town that he is charged with carrying forward. “We’re stewards,” he says, looking up from the playing field to the fans filing into Lambeau. “We’re taking care of the Packers for the next generation.”

TODAY, Green Bay - tomorrow: Paisley, or Kilmarnock, or even Govan - why not?

Common Sense From A Rangers Fan - Shockaroonie

SCANDINAVIAN forests have been felled for the newsprint required, websites have crashed under the load of on-line content posted, meanwhile, the seemingly eternal soap opera 'Edmiston Drive' continues to grip.

 

Just this week, on his 'Merlin' blog, Bill McMurdo posted a contribution from a Rangers fan, known only as 'The Kilty', which offered, unusually for this long-running debate, a modicum of common sense.

 

Bill has  agreed to my request that I be allowed to re-post Kilty's piece, which follows: the prelude piece is how Bill headed it on his blog.

 

Every now and then we get a belter post that simply has to be given a wider platform. Here is one from The Kilty – a regular poster who always has something constructive to say. If it were me, I’d get 30,000 leaflets printed with this on it for the next home game:-

For some ungodly reason Rangers fans all see themselves as corporate business men and tax experts. Rangers fans, unless they are shareholders, have no inherent right to be given any transparency.  The business dealings of the club have nothing whatsoever to do with any season ticket holder or ticket buying fan unless they have, as I said,  become a shareholder in Rangers International Football Club plc and that is the bottom line.

The Board only need answer to the shareholders. For some reason this notion of fan power and a false importance have been placed on the rank and file, along with their lust for knowledge that quite frankly many could not understand, including myself. This may spring from bad business conducted by the club in the past but it still does not give any fan the right to have any commercially sensitive information divulged to them. I am sick hearing phrases like “Who are BPH?“ and “We want transparency” as well as “Where did the money go?” We also hear “The Rangers performance was rubbish – we need better players” which then leads to “These players are getting paid too much”  and the old favourite of “The board are spivs” with moans that they took bonuses.

Unless you are a shareholder, none of that is any of your business. I have heard the standard excuse: “Well ah paid ma season ticket money so am entitled” but sorry, thats not the case. There are a vast multitude of Rangers fans that spend more per week from their wages in Tescos and Asda and some  on beers and spirits so by the same argument if I spend £50 a week on Tennents lager I should say who is on the board of the company. My Mrs spends easy £80 a week in Tescos – do you think they would tell me who their investors are ?? Or that I could get a group of my pals together and stand outside with blue cards waving them so that they would listen?

As for King, what he is doing is nothing short of trying to muscle his way in using blackmail. Is that what the norm is now? Get off to a great start, take control by default but when he doesn’t do as the fans want, is he a spiv or does he have to go too?

It has been said often and ignored just as much that you can take a whale out of the pool and put it in a bowl; it’s still a whale with all the needs of that whale. Rangers are that whale, stuck in a fish bowl. Did it cost any less to run Ibrox last year compared to the year before? Did Murray Park suddenly become a free enterprise zone ? We are in the same position as many companies are in and that is experiencing temporary cash flow problems. Many forget with all the transparency gurgling and spivs out pish that these men on the board have ensured we are debt free. All that on the back of reduced season ticket prices due to the division that was being played in.

Rangers don’t need transparency, they need STABILITY. That’s what makes teams win by good margins and that’s what makes the share price rise. It’s what gets sponsors, it’s what makes individuals and corporate investors want to part with their investment cash. At the present time no one wants to put money in just to get told what to do by delusional fans or have pathetic displays of disloyalty to men who put their hands in their own pockets to buy into our Club.

Im sorry but at the end of the day your ticket gets you in to be entertained at a football match – that’s where it stops unless, as I said, you are a shareholder in the management company. If you are not entertained, don’t go back; that’s your choice. I know that emotions etc complicate things but that is the bottom line.

 

Good Result - Terrible Game

CUP finals are the exception to the purist's view - that it matters not who won or lost, but how you played the game. No, when it comes to a final - just win the bloody thing, by any lawful means.

 

So, we would be churlish to say anything other than: "Congratulations" to Aberdeen, following this afternoon's League Cup win, at the expense of Inverness Caledonian Thistle. It certainly has been a long time coming, the return of the real feel good factor to Furryboots city.

 

That said, I found it difficult to watch a game, which again emphasised the paucity of talent and organisation within Scottish football these days.

 

Mind you, this is no recent phenomenon. Last week, in a second-hand book shop in Kilmarnock, I happened upon the late Bob Crampsey's excellent biography of Jock Stein, written in 1986, a year after the Big Man's death.

 

In the book Crampsey mentions the fall-off in talent in Scotland between the glory days of 1967 and the Lisbon Lions and Stein's departure from Celtic a decade later, and the even-greater fall-off between Stein departing Parkhead for Elland Road, then Hampden, and his too-early death eight years later.

 

Now, we look back on the squad Stein took to Spain in 1982, even the slightly less-stellar cast he took to Mexico four years later as the fag end of a golden era for Scottish football. Yet, if Stein and Crampsey could see this wasn't the case - we should be perhaps thankful they are no longer around to see the depths to which we have fallen today.

 

Sure, we have hope of better days ahead under WGS, but, until we have complete root and branch reform, Wee Gordon and his successors are being asked to fire fight with inadequate and out-dated equipment.

 

 

 

SPEAKING of inadequate and out-dated - no, I have little new to say about events around Rangers. I still see another huge car crash coming down the road at speed.

 

The Rangers Way of the past 30-years has been shown to be unfit for purpose, but, still, that's what Ra Peepul seem to want. More heartache to come.

 

 

 

I SEE, too, suggestions that all will soon be well around Kilmarnock. Sorry, but, I've seen this DVD before and I don't believe it.

 

Mind you, Billy Bowie, the local businessman who is emerging as the latest white (or should that be blue and white) hope to put the old club on an even keel and set it towards a happy and prosperous future.

 

Well, Billy is well-qualified for the task; his company moves a lot of shite around Ayrshire.

 

 

 

IN THE interests of balance, I should perhaps wonder, what is going on at Somerset Park, where they are suddenly scoring goals for fun and looking more and more likely to be involved in the end-of-season play-offs.

 

I went into wee Jim McSherry's excellent pub, the Wee Windaes in Ayr last week for one of their wonderful value pub lunches. One of the great ladies of Scottish football, Faye MacLeod, Ally's widow, was at the next table and it was such a joy to chat to her.

Well Done Rangers - Yawn

I AM certain this morning, the readers of this blog will join me in congratulating Rangers on winning what was - dependant on your point of view - either their 56th Scottish League title, or their second.

The speed with which they overwhelmed their opponents in the third tier of Scottish football was very impressive, bringing to mind such triumphs as the Nazi's progress through Poland and the Low Countries in 1939 and 1940. Let's just hope Rangers enjoy better fortune once the forces ranged against them get organised, than poor old Adolf's lot enjoyed!!!

Any way - they won their league, it's over, despite the reaction from the Scottish football public being one of being overwhelmingly under-whelmed. By the way, might I suggest that the way they won, with the help of two penalties at Ibrox, goes some way to negating the view of the wilder elements amongst the wider Celtic family, that Rangers are deid.

Look at last night's two penalties and the view has to be: Plus ca Change etc.

I FORGOT to mention in yesterday's blog post, my continued amazement at the positive spin our colleagues in the English media continue to put on poor performances from "English" clubs in Europe; said clubs being only English in as much as they play in the English League.

At half-time in the Bayern v Arsenal match, we were being assured that for the Gunners, the job was "half done". Pardon me, for the job to be fully done - Arsenal would have had to win by at least 3-2. When we were assured the job was half done, they were in the same position as they had been at kick-off, 45 mintues previously - trailing by two goals.

Therefore, in their efforts to win 3-2, far from being half-way there, they were still barely off the start line. This vision also over-looked the fact that, in boxing parlance: Bayern were "ahead on points". Still, let's not let reality get in the way of the English vision of their Premiership and the top clubs in it, as the best teams in the world, playing in the best league in the world.

Aye Right..

THE Ayr branch of Coffin Dodgers Are Us was winding down after our Wednesday morning exertions on the hardwood of Ayr's ten-pin bowling alley. I congratulated Robin, our groups tame Somerset Parker on Ayr United's five-nil demolition of Stranraer on Saturday and he replied: "Aye, we're a different team when big Kevin Kyle isn't playing - we have to keep the ball on the ground and pass it, rather than lumping it up to him."

That's a bit unfair on big KK, a player I have always felt had more about him that his admittedly awesome aerial power.

But, Robin, and a couple of others were also full of praise for the much-maligned Kris Boyd, who continues to score goals for fun at Kilmarnock.

Sure, Boydie had done some daft things, he's far from being a Denis Law, but, he's easily our top home-bred goal-scorer of the past couple of decades and maybe, now he is past the 30 mark and winding down, prior to getting out of the seniors to enjoy a spell of goal-gathering for Auchinleck Talbot (maybe in three or four years' time), we should cherish him.

OK, KB isn't a great player, but, by any standard, he is a great goal-scorer and, if Ayr United supporters are prepared to pay tribute to a Kilmarnock player - he must be doing something rright.