Why we all must heed the King coronation
IT’S a conspiracy, obviously. Just when everyone in Scotland should be focusing on t he rise of Rangers, Craig Thomson goes and steals their thunder with his handling of Dundee United versus Celtic…s hameful, utterly shameful.
On a serious note, yesterday’s Scottish Cup action might have allowed some to continue displaying their disinterest in ongoing events at Ibrox.
‘A nation shrugs’ seems to be the motto of those who insist that any developments at — insult alert — a second-tier club really means nothing to them. We don’t believe them, of course.
Least of all the Celtic supporters who manage to feign apathy while firing off angry emails (or maybe their CAPS LOCK is just stuck) about a new club, tax cheats and the inevitability of administration.
Sure, there are times when everyone — even the most eagle-eyed anoraks among the Rangers support — has been moved to turn off and tune out from the white noise surrounding the battle for Ibrox; crisis fatigue set in about three years ago, to be honest.
But everyone in the Scottish game should be interested in what happens next, now that Dave King — the HSBC and Vodafone of football investors? — has won the battle for control.
Of course, some rivals fear the return of Rangers to a position of prominence.
Not just because they have delighted in seeing their former tormentors suffer over recent years, but because they have enjoyed the breathing space created by their absence from the upper echelons.
Motherwell got a crack at the Champions League qualifiers.
Aberdeen had (have) a decent crack at the title.
And Celtic fans have enjoyed singing about rolling on towards 10 consecutive titles.
Is that particular party about to be disrupted?
Well, somewhere between the two extremes l aid out by so many bold soothsayers, the truth must lie.
Neither t he hype nor t he doomsday scenarios can possibly be 100-per-cent accurate.
King has convinced a l ot of people, even if his early talk about personally i nvesting tens and tens of millions without hope of recouping a penny seems to have been diluted over the past few days.
Really serious players, men with the money and a plan, don’t come in and start talking about attracting other investors.
They just spend what it takes and get the job done. Here’s a bold prediction, then. A lot of the cash needed to right this particular ship will come from the most reliable source of all — the Bank of Joe Punter.
Not t hrough s ome dodgy Ticketus- style mortgaging off of season- t i cket r evenues, but certainly through a surge in attendances and a major uptake of books for next season.
That’s just standard football finance. It is how Fergus McCann rebuilt Celtic, by realising the potential of the support.
Rangers, as much as any big club, are built on the loyalty of fans.
In essence, then, little about the short term has changed.
Save perhaps the prospect of a new manager arriving to at least contend for second place in the Championship.
The plan is still to reach the end of this season, hope to cut a deal with Mike Ashley that does not see him walk off with a 10-per- cent cut of any transfer revenue for the next thousand years, and then regroup.
Until they have examined each contract and opened every drawer, you cannot expect the new men to do much more than that.
Certainly not while King waits to be declared fit and proper by the Scottish Football Association, whose rules on the subject are, well, open to interpretation.
There will be plenty of time for all in Scottish football to debate and argue, yell and shout: ‘Yah boo sucks!’ on this very issue.
On reflection, then, maybe we should enjoy the lull, and the opportunity for national unity, provided by Mr Thomson’s performance at Tannadice.