flyingrodent

Shorter Rangers fans & ex-employees this week: We Are Terribly Precious. It'd save us all a lot of time and earache if the Rangers fans could just all decide now, once and for all, whether they wanted to be readmitted to the Third Division in 2012, or whether they instead wanted to be boosted up into the top tier. They currently seem to be saying that they wanted to stay, but we all well remember that they said that they wanted to go. Now they've got a team in the top tier next season, it looks like they really wanted to both stay and go, while not wanting to stay or to go. If they'd gone there would've been trouble; if they'd stayed, it would've been double. So come on, and let us know, eh? Did you want to stay or go?

The logic of the proposition Rangers made to reapply to the league = Dundee United relegated four years later ...is that because one event followed the other, then the former must have caused or strongly contributed to the latter. A version of the same thing, and only a little bit sillier: Comet retail chain enters administration = Rise of ISIS; Death of Ronnie Corbett.

I'm struggling to keep up with the Rangers logic here. First, when Rangers faced being treated exactly like any other club that was liquidated, it was Sink Us And We'll Sink You, We Must Stay In The Top Tier. Then, it was definitely We Want To Be Kicked Out And Enter In The Third Division, It's Only Right And Just. After that, it was We're Glad We're In The Third Division And It's Shameful That The Authorities Tried To Crowbar Us Into The First, For Financial Reasons. And now, it's back to We Should Never Have Been Treated Like Any Other Club, We Should Instead Have Been Kept In The Top Tier, Shame On You. Basically, it looks like we should've made Rangers reapply in accordance with the rules, while simultaneously breaking the rules to allow Rangers to keep a team in the top tier, and both of these options were unacceptable and vindictive. It makes no sense at all. Well, whatever. As I said then and will repeat, I think the biggest crime in their eyes isn't how Rangers were treated, so much as that they're all really, really upset that we laughed at them while it happened.

BBC Sportsound Twitter feed: Graeme Souness: "All those souls who thought that it was a great idea that Rangers got demoted surely they must accept they were wrong now" This is like Souness asking us all whether we accept that it was wrong of us, to let him grow that enormous moustache.

Haven't seen much evidence of this myself but then, I would say that. I hope you're relegated before the split.

In an era where the global trend is overwhelmingly towards closer international communication, stuff like the National's version of written Scots looks perverse and counterproductive, if not actively demented. Functionally speaking, language is just a tool for communication, one that evolves to meet the needs of its users. I can't see how e.g. learning how to write in phonetic Scots would be in any way useful, for anyone.

As you'll see if you look again, I was referring to other cases than the Dead Rangers one as "brazen tax-dodging cons". After all, HMRC can hardly use a positive outcome in their case against the OldCo, to support their case against the OldCo, can they? Since you've brought it up though, I'll leave it to posters to decide whether claiming in court that a large, lump-sum payment to be kept by the recipient forever counts as a "loan" is e.g. brazen or not. (As it happens, I think BDO are in with a shout here. If they can argue that payments = loans without being immediately laughed out of court or fined for being in contempt, then I'd say that the result is anybody's guess).

It's clearly plain English for "This judgement has serious implications and ramifications that will go far beyond this particular case, so it's best for everyone if the Supreme Court tests the arguments and delivers a definitive verdict". I suspect that the Supreme Court may agree, given that HMRC has been pretty up-front about using Deceased Rangers as a test-case, to set a legal precedent for use in pursuing some of the UK's more brazen tax-dodging cons.

It's the most wonderful time of the year. And I notice that those Rangers fans appear to have believed that administration and liquidation would mean that the club would die. I wonder if they'd still stick by their former opinion.

It's worth noting that Tedi is right, and there is "no argument" about Rangers continuation. Almost every football fan in the country thinks that Rangers died in 2012 and the new club is a tribute act. Only Rangers fans disagree. So this is only an "argument" in the sense that there's an "argument" about e.g. whether the moon-landings were faked.

That list of explanations for what happened between Spiers and a Rangers director, in full: - A professional journalist deliberately invented a story that might show Rangers in a bad light, purely motivated by malice and a desire to damage Rangers; He then intentionally orchestrated his own dismissal from a well-paid and cushy job, in order to show Rangers in a bad light and to win approval from Celtic fans; and now, the National Union of Journalists has backed the journalist, because the National Union of Journalists also hates Rangers and wants to show them in a bad light, or - A Rangers director told Spiers that he quite likes the Billy Boys song. Only a buffoon would believe that the former is more likely than the latter, regardless of which team they support.

Jesus Christ. So now the National Union of Journalists is controlled by deranged Rangers-haters as well, and their public statements are motivated by Rangers-hatred. Who else is part of this multi-tentacled conspiracy to make Rangers look bad? You don't usually hear this nonsense from people who don't also believe that the UN is plotting a military coup and that the Queen is a space-lizard.

You'll certainly find fans of other clubs who take just as much joy in making the world a less pleasant place to live - and that's true of mine, more so than others. Still, I'd say that it's the level of commitment to emboldened, belligerent, defiant stupidity that makes this particular case unusual.

I think the key to understanding Rangers fans is accepting that they're basically like Trump supporters - not only approving of their heroes being horrible, vile, spiteful morons, but actively glorying in it and celebrating it, simply because it annoys lots of people who they really don't like. Sociologists and psychologists would have a field day with this Spiers thing alone. I'm not sure that there's another phenomenon quite like it in world football. Lazio, maybe.

It's the sheer volume of absolute guff that they need to believe that's so impressive. You don't wind up e.g. making statements about how journalists deliberately get themselves sacked just to annoy Rangers, unless you've previously decided to believe a whole cartload of absolutely barking-mad, conspiracy-theorising lunacy about the role of the press and the relative importance of football as a sport. You kind of expect this stuff about politics, which has always been a playground for cranks and zoomers, but not about football. God only knows what people in the rest of Britain make of all this.

You really do have to believe a remarkable amount of absolute shyte, to be a Rangers fan these days. So, reporters file stories just to harm one particular club and deliberately get themselves fired from hugely profitable jobs, for no other reason than to suck up to fans of another club. Can you think of any other situation in life where this kind of thing would happen? No, you can't. Because it's ridiculous drivel.

Let me get this straight - you think that Spiers deliberately got himself fired, just to impress Celtic fans? A sport writing job at the Herald is one of the cushiest gigs you can imagine, and it pays very well. Impressing Celtic fans, on the other hand, pays nothing at all. The idea that anyone, let alone Spiers of all people, would deliberately pack one in so that football fans will think better of him, is absolutely absurd. You really need to give yourself a shake, here. You're spouting utter nonsense.

Money, pure and simple. The bottom line. Or as they're usually known, threats.

The really remarkable thing here is an editor refusing to stand behind one of his hacks who insists point blank that he heard a person make a statement. A hack who's willing to sacrifice a good paycheque for a cushy job on principle, no less. It's hard to explain how rare it is, for this kind of thing to happen - for an editor to jettison a hack and cave to pressure. Maybe the BBC with Andrew Gilligan, when they were in direct confrontation with the UK Government over the Iraq War. Editors are usually required to stand behind their hacks, much like chimney sweeps are required to sweep chimneys. And that's all gone out of the window, for Rangers. That's how odd it is.

Of all the cranks and zoomers who comment on football in Scotland professionally, it's noticeable that the Rangers fans have whipped up furious complaints about - Jim Spence, one of the very few hacks who got into journalism through fanzines, i.e. was so much of a fan of his club that he made a career of it, and - Graeme Spiers, who is basically a drippy and quite boring Christian geezer who specialises in saying controversial things like "sectarian chanting is quite bad" and in a particularly dull form of rose-tinted retrospection.

Spiers is basically Ned Flanders with wistful anecdotes. The idea that he's some kind of deranged hate-monger is laughable.

Probably worth asking here: What would a journalist get out of making up a story, even one as unremarkable as this and then continuing to stand by it, even after his employers have caved in to the source of the story? The answer is - a load of grief from his boss, and a load of grief from random football fans. And that's it - no upside, no personal benefit at all. Why would anyone voluntarily incur such levels of grief, when it'd be far more in his interest to just keep quiet? Well, either because - Spiers just pure hates the Rangers and is on a mad quest to make them look bad, or - Because he's telling the truth. I don't think you have to be Sherlock Holmes to work out which of these conclusions is most likely to be accurate.

I imagine that a Rangers Newco fan would know more about "getting wound up" than fans of most other clubs, Livingston and Gretna aside.

A minor but notable difference, recently: much of the press reported Rangers' statements about making payments as "Rangers claim they have made payments" as opposed to the previous "Rangers have made payments". Most agencies and papers went for the latter, the first time round. Not this time. Presumably, the idea that false statements might be made at Ibrox hadn't occurred to them until now.

Amusing story: In 1995, my friend's dad was one of the lead architects of the new Celtic Park, and he said that every single time Fergus McCann asked a question, two people would answer simultaneously. Every single time. I had a brief job at Celtic Park at that point, checking seats to see they wouldn't fall apart. As it turned out, it was that dude plummeting over the side of the top tier during the Newcastle game that was the main issue.