Sweet Little Lies

Tell me all your sweet, sweet little lies All about the dark places you hide Tell me all your problems, make them mine Tell me all your sweet, sweet little lies The stridency of Scottish journalist/pundits, particularly coming from those on the BBC Sportsound platform from where they cry out for an investigation into what … Read more

Les Says It is Time to Ask The Audience?

Saying the last couple of weeks has been colourful for Scottish Football would be an understatement. We are now in a position where we have a Taskforce co-chaired by the heads of two clubs to look at what needs to be done in the Covid 19 landscape right now and into whatever future unfolds. Representatives … Read more

SPFL Myopia Flares into Civil War

The Covid 19 Pandemic is a truly serious game-changing situation for us all.We are all currently staring into a future with no declared road map exit ofhow we might move back to normality and the certainty of disruption now andlong into the future. Against the background of lockdown to curb the virus spread we have all … Read more

Own Goal Time in Scottish Football?

In these difficult Covid 19 dominated times with no apparent roadmap for escape we are all on the cusp of financial pressures that will only get worse for our clubs and football communities. Ahead of writing this I spoke with a couple of club insiders this morning looking for extra insight. No surprises that both … Read more

A Lie for a Lie

The “Lawwell Letter” is trending everywhere this week. To elucidate, it is email sent to (among others) Peter Lawwell and Eric Riley of Celtic on 26 July 2012 by SPL CEO Neil Doncaster. The email came with an attached copy of the Five Way Agreement (hereafter “5WA”, the deal between Sevco, Rangers, the SFA, the … Read more

Resolution 12 & The Broken Bond

Celtic Shareholders who put forward a resolution to the Celtic AGM in 2013 are preparing for the 2019 AGM tomorrow and some of their conclusions are reproduced below. Celtic are planning to vote the current resolution of 2019 down after several years of kicking the can down the road after an agreement to adjourn the 2013 motion was agreed at that AGM.

Given the weight of evidence, and the prevarication that has gone on for this extended period of time, you don’t have to be a student of politics to infer that Celtic are failing their own shareholders over this.

There appears to have been, at best, a failure of SFA governance over this issue. At worst? Well that doesn’t really bear thinking about. That Celtic (and other clubs too) have been in possession of the evidence outlined below but have failed to act on it is a damning indictment of the quality of people running our clubs. Peter Lawwell’s words from 2008 about the integrity of competition seem hollow coming from the same lips as the man who has failed to pursue any kind of sporting integrity over upholding the rules of the game.

Of course we are talking about a fundamental difference in how people see the game. There are those of us who (some say naively) consider that upholding the aspects of fair play and competition are paramount, and those who see the commercial aspects of the game as the foremost consideration. A pragmatist might find a way to accommodate both, but there are apparently no pragmatists in boardrooms all over Scotland – just financial accountants.

It would be unfair to categorise the latter constituency as suffering from some kind of character defect of course. Doesn’t make you a bad person because short term financial gain is your thing.

But it puts you at odds with the paying punters – or at least some of them. As a Celtic fan myself, I’m not so sure that I can take any real joy from my own club’s success if I have come to the conclusion that they themselves are happy with a rigged competition. I am not so sure I can credibly throw stones at anyone who is caught cheating when I see that serious evidence of malpractice is being ignored and hidden under the rug by my own club.

I am sure there are those who feel the same as I do. Are there enough of us? Probably not, but the effect of it all from a personal perspective, is that it disconnects me from the process where common goals and objectives are shared between fans, players and clubs. That’s what clubs are for after all isn’t it?

In short, if the game is rigged, there is no common objective.

And consequently, many of us, deprived of that shared mission, that bond broken, will be forced to re-evaluate their relationship with their clubs.

We all have our own thoughts, but the urge to walk away forever is strong with me.

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Celtic’s Questions to Answer

There are a number of quite separate elements in the allegations of corruption which have been made against our Football Governance bodies and some of our clubs. There is the allegation that RFC of 1872 lied to the Licensing Committee of the SFA about their tax indebtedness as at 31 March 2011; there is the … Read more

In Whose Interests

Any organisation’s plan for a top-down review of development would ordinarily be welcome news. Self evaluation, or even better independent evaluation is an ongoing process amongst professionals, individually and collectively alike. In the case of the SFA however a healthy scepticism is required. We are after all dealing with people who are the poster boys … Read more

Bad Money?

It’s now seven years since the festering sore on the skin of Scottish Football became fully septic, causing the liquidation of Rangers Football Club. Many of us at that time felt that the environment which had enabled the systematic, industrial scale cheating by that club, having now been exposed as unfit to fulfil its purpose, … Read more