Paul
07-05-2008, 12:21:09 PM
Just read this on another website.
"During the last month I've been alarmed, but not surprised, by the myths
and lies peddled by Rangers and the Scottish Media. Indeed, not one hack has
dared to speculate that the predicament Rangers are in is mostly of their
own making, or has offered a non-jingoistic catalyst for a change to the
schedule.
What I've tried to do here is have a look at the most common soundbytes
often dished out as incontrovertible evidence.
Lie: Rangers have had no help from the SPL
The season has been extended by the best part of a week to accommodate
Rangers' fixture congestion. As far as I can work out, this is unprecedented
in the modern era... indeed, Celtic played three games in four days at the
ass end of their 1974 one-sub-each-no-such-thing-as-squad-rotation title
challenge.
But that's not the only help that they have had from the SPL this season :
Armed with a piece of paper saying, "Lyon huv hud heir game postponed,"
Rangers petitioned the SPL, aiming to have their match with the mighty
Gretna put back until a later date. As we know, it succeeded.
QUOTE (BBC)
3rd Dec: "And, with Gretna giving backing to the request, the decision to
postpone was taken by SPL chairman Lex Gold and secretary Iain Blair.
The SPL pointed out that the French authorities had allowed Lyon a similar
weekend off, cancelling their tie at Caen."
[/URL]
However, it came to light that Lyon hadn't had their game postponed at all.
In fact, they applied for the cancellation AFTER hearing the *****had bought
themselves a free week.
QUOTE (BBC)
6th Dec: Lyon have failed to have Saturday's league game against Caen
postponed to give them time to prepare for the Champions League clash with
Rangers.
"We requested the postponement in order to be at the same level as our
rivals who succeeded in postponing their Scottish league game against
Gretna," he said.
[URL="http://www.monthehoops.co.uk/vcheckvirus.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.bbc.co.uk%2F sport1%2Fhi%2Ffoot...rs%2F7131441.stm"] (http://www.monthehoops.co.uk/vcheckvirus.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.bbc.co.uk%2F sport1%2Fhi%2Ffoot...rs%2F7122365.stm)
Further questions should have been asked about the subsequent scheduling of both this Gretna match, and the St. Mirren match postponed prior to
Scotland's Euro Qualifier against Italy. Why weren't these matches played at the first available opportunity? Rangers had free midweeks pre-Christmas.
Celtic managed to play their home match against Falkirk in between their
Champions League and SPL fixtures. Indeed, Celtic were able to play FOUR
matches in ten days at the start of December, dropping four points in the
process (Hearts and St Mirren).
Myth: It's all someone else's fault
Nonsense.
Gretna, and dodgy fixture re-scheduling aside, Rangers have had ample
opportunity to fix out their own congestion.
The failure of Scotland's Heroes (© Daily Record) to beat Hibs and
lower-league Partick Thistle at the first time of asking have padded out
their fixture fulfilment requirements.
The match against East Stirling was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch. On
the face of it, that seems perfectly reasonable in the Scottish winter.
However, when the next unchallenged soundbytes emit from President Murray
about lowering the Ibrox pitch again to cram more seats in, shouldn't
someone - anyone - point out that they are ****ing distance from a major
river?
Obviously the free weekend after the tragic death of Phil O'Donnell was
thrust upon them. But it is worth noting that Dundee United, the team they
tried not to play this Saturday, were forced to complete their next fixture
at the time, despite watching a friend and opponent die in front of them a
few days previous. Placed beside that, Rangers' recent request and
subsequent petulant outburst looks embarrassingly trivial.
Lie: "This will make the SPL a laughing stock"
Seriously, the world doesn't care about the SPL's fixture list. Truly.
Take Middlesborough in 2006, they managed to get to the UEFA Cup final. Here was their fixture list.
March
Thu 30 20:45 A FC Basel UEFA
April
Sun 2 15:00 A Manchester City PREM
Thu 6 20:00 H FC Basel UEFA
Sun 9 15:00 H Newcastle PREM
We 12 20:05 H Charlton FACP
Sat 15 15:00 A Portsmouth PREM
Mon 17 15:00 H West Ham Utd PREM
Thu 20 20:45 A S Bucuresti UEFA
Sun 23 16:00 H West Ham Utd FACP
Thu 27 20:02 H S Bucuresti UEFA
Sat 29 15:00 H Everton PREM
May
Mon 1 20:00 A Man Utd PREM
Wed 3 20:00 A Bolton PREM
Sun 7 15:00 A Fulham PREM
Wed 10 19:45 H Sevilla Futbol UEFA
Let's have a look at some highlights and see how many of Rangers, "Laughing Stock" boxes it ticks...
* Middle of April, four games in eight days.
* A run of three away games in a row at the end of the season.
* Not only managed a game on the Saturday preceding a midweek AWAY tie in Romania, but squeezed in a cheeky match at home to West Ham on the Monday before they flew out.
* Away to Fulham on the SUNDAY before the UEFA Cup final. Not the Saturday that Rangers are being asked to play on, but the FRICKING SUNDAY.
Now, according to Lord Murray's self-declared rules, that should mean we all consider the English Premiership the joke of world football. Don't we?
Anyone?
Secondly, and non-Middlesbrough related this year, the FA Cup is scheduled
four days before the Champions League final. Is Darth Murray seriously
trying to tell us that this would have been moved should Chelsea or Man
United have been gracing the Wembley Turf?
Myth: The SPL should follow the Russian FA's lead
Yes, the Russian FA have postponed Zenit's matches before the UEFA Cup final, and fair play to them. But this being cited as a precedent is
completely insane.
St. Petersburg, literally Baltic, play in a summer league, meaning that they
are only a few games into their season... they have the luxury of playing
with a whole year's fixture list. If only Walter could turn back time and
ask for some games to be frivolously postponed to help Rangers.
Ironically, the two postponements this year, "for the greater good," were
Rangers at home to Lyon, and Scotland at home to Italy. Both were humped.
Secondly, and covered above, have Zenit actually had their fixtures moved,
or are Rangers trying to pull the same Lyon trick again?
Lie: "We're doing it for Scotland"
Just like Rangers had Scotland's best interests in mind when they tapped-up and poached Scotland's manager, in the middle of one of their most spectacular attempts at qualifying for a finals tournament in many years?
And where were the media when Kenny McDowell admitted that Smith had offered him a job at Ibrox BEFORE Beloved Walter had even handed in his notice at the SFA?
Were Rangers, "doing it for Scotland," when they withdrew five players from
the squad to face Croatia. Weir managed to evade even being called up, but four were out injured, including Christian Dailly with a BROKEN FOOT;
luckily, a trip to Lourdes healed everyone enough to play in the league
match the following weekend.
Lie: "It's to help win the UEFA Cup"
If Rangers want the UEFA Cup so badly that they want to inconvenience the other eleven teams, then why can't they now play a play a back-up team against Dundee United so that only they are inconvenienced? Or, failing that, move the Dundee United game to after the UEFA final, and play their last four games in a week, finishing on the Thursday?
Remember, Bolton deliberately got themselves knocked out of Europe to
concentrate on league matters. Rangers made sure that they deflected
extension talk as long as possible until there was no other alternative but
to extend the league. I speculate that their current tantrum is a much to do with them shampooting it over the league slipping away a it is to do with
the party line. And where are the journos putting these questions to
Rangers?
"We never have, and we never will ask for an extension," Walter Smith
"We want an extension," Martin Bain
"It's a fking joke we never had an extension," Emperor Murray
Lie: "Celtic got help in the Seville Season"
Again, Rangers and the press are trying to cite Celtic's similar run up as another precedent.
In 2003, the season was NOT extended. In fact, Celtic were forced to play
all pre-split games before the split, a decision that made Ian MacLeod
consider taking the league to the Court of Session. Compare and contrast
with Rangers, who get to play St Mirren (one of their pre-split games) after
the split.
In that season, only one game was brought forward, Celtic v Dundee - and
that was thanks to Jim Duffy at Dundee, not SPL politics and shenanigans.
Only one team was inconvenienced by that shift, not eleven.
And while we're on postponements, this is how other teams get on at the SPL.
Aberdeen were not allowed to move their pre-Copenhagen match in 2007. This
was despite Rangers having done so a few weeks earlier.
In October last year, Kilmarnock had to play a match in October with only 5
subs (3 of whom were too injured to play).
Mentioned earlier, Dundee United were told to get on with it a few days
after Phil O'Donnell died yards away from some of their players.
And, my favourite, from September 2000:
QUOTE (bbc)
Rangers have denied the club have been deliberately obstructive by refusing to postpone their Premier League match against Hearts on Sunday.The Tynecastle club return back to Scotland late on Friday afternoon after
their Uefa Cup first round game against Stuttgart.
Hearts had asked the Ibrox club to put back the game, but Rangers turned
down their request after consultation with manager Dick Advocaat.
But in a similar situation last October the Edinburgh outfit agreed to
switch a fixture between the two clubs to help Rangers' Champions League
campaign.
Anyway, I'm a Celtic fan, so this is obviously biased and one-sided. I'll
leave this poorly-penned nonsense with a few words from someone more
qualified than I:
"I don't know what they're (Celtic) complaining about, they should just get
<!-- / message --><!-- controls --> on with it, I wish we were in their position," Alex McLeish, 2003. "
GIRUY Ya moaning Bassas :D
"During the last month I've been alarmed, but not surprised, by the myths
and lies peddled by Rangers and the Scottish Media. Indeed, not one hack has
dared to speculate that the predicament Rangers are in is mostly of their
own making, or has offered a non-jingoistic catalyst for a change to the
schedule.
What I've tried to do here is have a look at the most common soundbytes
often dished out as incontrovertible evidence.
Lie: Rangers have had no help from the SPL
The season has been extended by the best part of a week to accommodate
Rangers' fixture congestion. As far as I can work out, this is unprecedented
in the modern era... indeed, Celtic played three games in four days at the
ass end of their 1974 one-sub-each-no-such-thing-as-squad-rotation title
challenge.
But that's not the only help that they have had from the SPL this season :
Armed with a piece of paper saying, "Lyon huv hud heir game postponed,"
Rangers petitioned the SPL, aiming to have their match with the mighty
Gretna put back until a later date. As we know, it succeeded.
QUOTE (BBC)
3rd Dec: "And, with Gretna giving backing to the request, the decision to
postpone was taken by SPL chairman Lex Gold and secretary Iain Blair.
The SPL pointed out that the French authorities had allowed Lyon a similar
weekend off, cancelling their tie at Caen."
[/URL]
However, it came to light that Lyon hadn't had their game postponed at all.
In fact, they applied for the cancellation AFTER hearing the *****had bought
themselves a free week.
QUOTE (BBC)
6th Dec: Lyon have failed to have Saturday's league game against Caen
postponed to give them time to prepare for the Champions League clash with
Rangers.
"We requested the postponement in order to be at the same level as our
rivals who succeeded in postponing their Scottish league game against
Gretna," he said.
[URL="http://www.monthehoops.co.uk/vcheckvirus.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.bbc.co.uk%2F sport1%2Fhi%2Ffoot...rs%2F7131441.stm"] (http://www.monthehoops.co.uk/vcheckvirus.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.bbc.co.uk%2F sport1%2Fhi%2Ffoot...rs%2F7122365.stm)
Further questions should have been asked about the subsequent scheduling of both this Gretna match, and the St. Mirren match postponed prior to
Scotland's Euro Qualifier against Italy. Why weren't these matches played at the first available opportunity? Rangers had free midweeks pre-Christmas.
Celtic managed to play their home match against Falkirk in between their
Champions League and SPL fixtures. Indeed, Celtic were able to play FOUR
matches in ten days at the start of December, dropping four points in the
process (Hearts and St Mirren).
Myth: It's all someone else's fault
Nonsense.
Gretna, and dodgy fixture re-scheduling aside, Rangers have had ample
opportunity to fix out their own congestion.
The failure of Scotland's Heroes (© Daily Record) to beat Hibs and
lower-league Partick Thistle at the first time of asking have padded out
their fixture fulfilment requirements.
The match against East Stirling was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch. On
the face of it, that seems perfectly reasonable in the Scottish winter.
However, when the next unchallenged soundbytes emit from President Murray
about lowering the Ibrox pitch again to cram more seats in, shouldn't
someone - anyone - point out that they are ****ing distance from a major
river?
Obviously the free weekend after the tragic death of Phil O'Donnell was
thrust upon them. But it is worth noting that Dundee United, the team they
tried not to play this Saturday, were forced to complete their next fixture
at the time, despite watching a friend and opponent die in front of them a
few days previous. Placed beside that, Rangers' recent request and
subsequent petulant outburst looks embarrassingly trivial.
Lie: "This will make the SPL a laughing stock"
Seriously, the world doesn't care about the SPL's fixture list. Truly.
Take Middlesborough in 2006, they managed to get to the UEFA Cup final. Here was their fixture list.
March
Thu 30 20:45 A FC Basel UEFA
April
Sun 2 15:00 A Manchester City PREM
Thu 6 20:00 H FC Basel UEFA
Sun 9 15:00 H Newcastle PREM
We 12 20:05 H Charlton FACP
Sat 15 15:00 A Portsmouth PREM
Mon 17 15:00 H West Ham Utd PREM
Thu 20 20:45 A S Bucuresti UEFA
Sun 23 16:00 H West Ham Utd FACP
Thu 27 20:02 H S Bucuresti UEFA
Sat 29 15:00 H Everton PREM
May
Mon 1 20:00 A Man Utd PREM
Wed 3 20:00 A Bolton PREM
Sun 7 15:00 A Fulham PREM
Wed 10 19:45 H Sevilla Futbol UEFA
Let's have a look at some highlights and see how many of Rangers, "Laughing Stock" boxes it ticks...
* Middle of April, four games in eight days.
* A run of three away games in a row at the end of the season.
* Not only managed a game on the Saturday preceding a midweek AWAY tie in Romania, but squeezed in a cheeky match at home to West Ham on the Monday before they flew out.
* Away to Fulham on the SUNDAY before the UEFA Cup final. Not the Saturday that Rangers are being asked to play on, but the FRICKING SUNDAY.
Now, according to Lord Murray's self-declared rules, that should mean we all consider the English Premiership the joke of world football. Don't we?
Anyone?
Secondly, and non-Middlesbrough related this year, the FA Cup is scheduled
four days before the Champions League final. Is Darth Murray seriously
trying to tell us that this would have been moved should Chelsea or Man
United have been gracing the Wembley Turf?
Myth: The SPL should follow the Russian FA's lead
Yes, the Russian FA have postponed Zenit's matches before the UEFA Cup final, and fair play to them. But this being cited as a precedent is
completely insane.
St. Petersburg, literally Baltic, play in a summer league, meaning that they
are only a few games into their season... they have the luxury of playing
with a whole year's fixture list. If only Walter could turn back time and
ask for some games to be frivolously postponed to help Rangers.
Ironically, the two postponements this year, "for the greater good," were
Rangers at home to Lyon, and Scotland at home to Italy. Both were humped.
Secondly, and covered above, have Zenit actually had their fixtures moved,
or are Rangers trying to pull the same Lyon trick again?
Lie: "We're doing it for Scotland"
Just like Rangers had Scotland's best interests in mind when they tapped-up and poached Scotland's manager, in the middle of one of their most spectacular attempts at qualifying for a finals tournament in many years?
And where were the media when Kenny McDowell admitted that Smith had offered him a job at Ibrox BEFORE Beloved Walter had even handed in his notice at the SFA?
Were Rangers, "doing it for Scotland," when they withdrew five players from
the squad to face Croatia. Weir managed to evade even being called up, but four were out injured, including Christian Dailly with a BROKEN FOOT;
luckily, a trip to Lourdes healed everyone enough to play in the league
match the following weekend.
Lie: "It's to help win the UEFA Cup"
If Rangers want the UEFA Cup so badly that they want to inconvenience the other eleven teams, then why can't they now play a play a back-up team against Dundee United so that only they are inconvenienced? Or, failing that, move the Dundee United game to after the UEFA final, and play their last four games in a week, finishing on the Thursday?
Remember, Bolton deliberately got themselves knocked out of Europe to
concentrate on league matters. Rangers made sure that they deflected
extension talk as long as possible until there was no other alternative but
to extend the league. I speculate that their current tantrum is a much to do with them shampooting it over the league slipping away a it is to do with
the party line. And where are the journos putting these questions to
Rangers?
"We never have, and we never will ask for an extension," Walter Smith
"We want an extension," Martin Bain
"It's a fking joke we never had an extension," Emperor Murray
Lie: "Celtic got help in the Seville Season"
Again, Rangers and the press are trying to cite Celtic's similar run up as another precedent.
In 2003, the season was NOT extended. In fact, Celtic were forced to play
all pre-split games before the split, a decision that made Ian MacLeod
consider taking the league to the Court of Session. Compare and contrast
with Rangers, who get to play St Mirren (one of their pre-split games) after
the split.
In that season, only one game was brought forward, Celtic v Dundee - and
that was thanks to Jim Duffy at Dundee, not SPL politics and shenanigans.
Only one team was inconvenienced by that shift, not eleven.
And while we're on postponements, this is how other teams get on at the SPL.
Aberdeen were not allowed to move their pre-Copenhagen match in 2007. This
was despite Rangers having done so a few weeks earlier.
In October last year, Kilmarnock had to play a match in October with only 5
subs (3 of whom were too injured to play).
Mentioned earlier, Dundee United were told to get on with it a few days
after Phil O'Donnell died yards away from some of their players.
And, my favourite, from September 2000:
QUOTE (bbc)
Rangers have denied the club have been deliberately obstructive by refusing to postpone their Premier League match against Hearts on Sunday.The Tynecastle club return back to Scotland late on Friday afternoon after
their Uefa Cup first round game against Stuttgart.
Hearts had asked the Ibrox club to put back the game, but Rangers turned
down their request after consultation with manager Dick Advocaat.
But in a similar situation last October the Edinburgh outfit agreed to
switch a fixture between the two clubs to help Rangers' Champions League
campaign.
Anyway, I'm a Celtic fan, so this is obviously biased and one-sided. I'll
leave this poorly-penned nonsense with a few words from someone more
qualified than I:
"I don't know what they're (Celtic) complaining about, they should just get
<!-- / message --><!-- controls --> on with it, I wish we were in their position," Alex McLeish, 2003. "
GIRUY Ya moaning Bassas :D