Flanagan has much to regret but deserves a second chance
BILL STRUTH died in 1956. yet the imprint of a formidable, iconic Rangers manager still runs through the club six decades later. The main stand was renamed in his honour. a bust of his head still glowers down on anyone daring to traipse up the marble staircase without a collar and tie.
a stern disciplinarian, the standards of dress and behaviour instilled 70 years ago by Struth don’t hold much water these days. In the Love Island era pretty much anything goes. Rangers players even wear jeans to training.
yet that does nothing to diminish a level of unease among some Rangers fans over the capture of Jon Flanagan on a two-year contract. In football terms the signing of a former team-mate is a no-brainer for Steven Gerrard.
The defender made his Liverpool debut at 18 and won an England cap against Ecuador in 2014. If James Tavernier leaves, Rangers have secured themselves the perfect replacement. yet the real question is not one of footballing ability.
Signing Flanagan is the first test of Gerrard’s managerial judgment. His first ethical and moral dilemma.
In January the 25-year-old pled guilty in Liverpool Crown Court to the common law assault of Rachael Wall, his partner of 18 months.
The court witnessed CCTV footage from outside Il Forno restaurant in Liverpool from 3.20am on Friday, December 22. The pictures showed Flanagan hitting Wall, pushing her against a wall twice and then kicking her.
a witness told the court of Flanagan placing a hand on his partner’s neck and the other on her throat before he ‘slammed her against the wall’. The witness shouted to Flanagan that he was ‘out of order’ with the footballer replying: ‘Shut the f*** up, d ******* , I’ll come and knock you out.’
District judge Wendy Lloyd sentenced Flanagan to a community order he’ll continue to serve for the first six months of his Rangers career. It involves 15 rehabilitation activity days, 40 hours of unpaid work, £85 costs and an £85 victim surcharge. In a statement, Liverpool said the player had failed to ‘live up to the values’ of the club.
at a club where Struth was known to fine players caught walking towards Ibrox with their hands in their pockets, how does a disturbing public assault sit within today’s Rangers values?
no one kids themselves football operates by some strong code of moral exceptionalism. It doesn’t.
David Goodwillie, accused of rape by a civil court, was landed with a damages bill of £100,000 — and still landed a game with Clyde. Livingston’s Declan Gallagher was given a three-year prison sentence for the brutal assault of a chef and now finds himself preparing for a return to the SPFL Premiership.
There are desperate football clubs willing to employ repentant sinners up and down the land. If Rangers hadn’t signed Flanagan someone else would have. What a player does off the park has never mattered quite so much as what he does on it.
When Leigh Griffiths joined Celtic in 2012 some supporters held their nose. From breach of the peace to offensive chants about Rudi Skacel in pubs, the Parkhead striker was a front-page staple.
One 40-goal season and two free-kicks against England later, he’s on the verge of a new long-term contract.
Footballers are not robots. Many of them come from working-class backgrounds, they drink, they womanise. Sometimes all three.
Many are hopelessly ill-equipped for the wealth, the public spotlight or the sheer level of superficial, fickle adulation football brings their way.
However, that neither excuses nor mitigates the actions of Jon Flanagan last Christmas. He was lucky to escape jail.
But Rangers assistant manager Gary Mcallister says the full-back is deeply ‘remorseful’ and you have to assume that Gerrard was looking for a few things in his former anfield team-mate’s eyes before signing him.
Contrition, sorrow. above all, a real desire to repay a significant leap of faith.
Granted a second chance, Flanagan owes his new manager big-time.
In court his solicitor Lionel Greig claimed: ‘He deeply regrets his behaviour and there is genuine remorse.’
Flanagan’s girlfriend saw enough remorse before the trial to ask the court to refrain from showing the CCTV images publicly. But there was no way of putting the genie back in the bottle. no way of undoing the past.
Justice had to be seen to be done. and a court of law duly passed a punishment deemed to be worthy of the crime. all of which raises an awkward question.
Everyone is entitled to their misgivings. But should a professional footballer tainted, publicly shamed and ordered to serve his time really be condemned to another trial by a social media lynch mob?
If Jon Flanagan can’t play for Rangers now where can he play?