h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Portsmouth's troubles arose because the idiots on the board of directors repeatedly sold the club to foreign crooks without proper due diligence or assurances. It's exacerbated by the unfair distribution of wealth in English football since the Premiership was set up twenty years ago, but that's another, much bigger story.

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Same story up here. Rangers and Celtic don't just *want* to win the league, they *have* to win to sustain their spending. They also hoover up most of the tv money and pull tricks like charging the other clubs a commission for selling their own tickets.

Oddly SWL I am reading your 'buy a place' post whilst on the train travelling to the Wimbledon v Dag and Redbridge game.

If Rangers were to stay in the same place (roughly), rather than move 60 miles away, I would expect support to stick with it. Today's attendance at W'don will be around 4,500. Not an awful lot less than we sometimes got at Plough Lane under the circumstances. And it only took 9 years (but it was worth it).

PP

Dagenham and Redbridge! Perhaps Rangers and Celtic could amalgamate!

PP

Two cheeks of the same arse anyway.

In news that comes as no surprise whatsoever, a Glasgow newspaper runs a story about the Old Firm leaving the SPL to take part in an "Atlantic League". Absolutely nothing to do with the other 10 SPL clubs meeting this week to discuss changes.

This is maybe something that those not in Scotland don't get, just how much the Glasgow media distorts the real picture. Ever since Rangers went into administration, we've had Traynor of the Daily Record and Chick Young of the BBC repeatedly telling us Scottish football will die without Rangers. Legendary St Mirren supporter Chick Young () has been on the verge of tears all week, culminating with a desperate plea on the Radio for bidders to "Please, please, please" come forward to save Rangers on Thursday evening. Even Tom English, the Irishman at the Scotsman has been peddling the pish that all supporters want Rangers saved for the good of the game.

What would happen without the Old Firm? I'd imagine that there would have to be some fairly radical adjustments to the budgets and playing staff of other teams as a result of lost gate and TV income. But apart from short term pain I wonder if what would be left would be a more competitive league. Would Hibs and Hearts arise to be come the New Firm, or would it lead to a genuinely more open competition?

When I worked in Scotland, the 'Record' tended to be referred to as 'the Daily Rangers'.

"Even Tom English, the Irishman at the Scotsman...."

Terrific sentence.

As you said swl, the current TV deal depends on regular Old Firm games - that's all the broadcasters are really interested in. Without Rangers the SPL, for the first few years at least, would be reduced to seeing how long it took for Celtic to win and it wouldn't be remotely competitive. Is there any other European league where there is only one realistic winner?

Hibs and Hearts might be able to catch up once they've got a bit of European revenues in their pockets and the kind of player European footie attracts in their teams but surely that's a while off.

I quite liked that as I was writing it.

Yeah - take the Old Firm out and Dunfermline & Kilmarnock are screwed. They're both seriously in debt already. The other clubs have varying degrees of indebtedness, but it's mainly to generous benefactors. Apparently Hearts and Hibs used to draw bigger crowds than the Old Firm in the post war period and the effect of Old Firm travelling support is over-rated. Someone did the sums and showed that Motherwell saw home support drop for games against the Old Firm and a net gain over the four games in the season of only 4000 or so. At an average £15, that's only £60k a season and has to be balanced against the fans who stay away from old firm games.

And the talk of SKY being uninterested isn't entirely true either. There might be less money but the leagues could be more flexible. Summer football could be a possibility which would be attractive to SKY. To date it's been the old firm who've blocked summer football because of all the foreigners and internationals in their squads.

But, let Rangers carry on or allow a Newco Rangers straight in and the entire SPL becomes unbankable. What financial institution is going to lend to companies in an organisation that has no effective barrier to members screwing over creditors at will?

It shows how deeply embedded the idea of an old-firm-style league is that people are even discussing a potential Hearts/Hibs dominance, when Hibs are a kick in the arse off relegation.

Rosenborg won the Norwegian league in 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004

There was, of course, Steaua Bucharest, who won the league 1951, 1952, 1953, 1956, 1959–60, 1960–61, 1967–68, 1975–76, 1977–78, 1984–85, 1985–86, 1986–87, 1987–88, 1988–89, 1992–93, 1993–94, 1994–95, 1995–96, 1996–97, 1997–98, 2000–01, 2004–05, 2005–06.

And the Cup 1948–49, 1950, 1951, 1952, 1955, 1961–62, 1965–66, 1966–67, 1968–69, 1969–70, 1970–71, 1975–76, 1978–79, 1984–85, 1986–87, 1987–88, 1988–89, 1991–92, 1995–96, 1996–97, 1998–99, 2010–11

They were the Romanian army's football team, and I don't think opposing teams tended to quibble with the ref's decisions when they played.

I stand educated. Cheers gents

As I read this thread, it occurs to me that the football business model is really weird.

Teams competing with each other absolutely depend on each other for financial success.

Take away Sainsburys and Tesco get stronger.

Take away Ford and Vauxhall get stronger.

Take away Rangers and Celtic get weaker.

But the whole SPL and SFL thing is hopelessly engineered. How many times did Celtic play rangers last year? 6? I really don't want to see Wimbledon play Crawley 6 times a season.

PP

The best jokes are the unintended ones. Rangers hastily launched a fighting fund for fans to contribute to today. A banner was printed up and a publicity shot was taken. Fans were asked to contribute by Paypal to assembly@bluenose.co.uk. A wee while later this was hastily changed on the Facebook page to assembly@thebluenose.co.uk. In the interim, a rather surprised Mr Custard of the Bluenose Clown Hire Co in Leicestershire had been receiving some unexpected windfalls

What's his first name? Burt? Or maybe Egon?

B

His wife is a drag queen called RuBarbie...

B

Otherwise known as the Custard Tart, of course.

B

Of course his half-Swedish son is called Lars-Stan...

B

And his daughter, who is on the way to the graveyard, taking her Custard Mary Mourning Walk.

OK, I'll stop now.

B