RANGERS CHIEFS ARE TAKING FANS FOR MUGS WITH NEW FOURTH KIT
IT’S one thing Rangers adopting a scorched earth policy towards the rest of Scottish football. Taking a blowtorch to the relationship with their own fans is a bold new strategy. Promotional videos for a new fourth replica kit appeared online yesterday morning. The grim faces of the players promoting the new black shirt reflected the mood of a support who feel they’re being taken for mugs by their own club. Keen to hand out lectures to others on corporate governance, the Ibrox hierarchy have been fined £225,000 by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) for their involvement in price fixing and conspiring to push up the prices of kits to their own supporters for a short period four years ago. Now, in the face of a savage costof-living crisis, comes an attempt to push a fourth kit supporters don’t especially seem to like, want or need.
Lest anyone forget Rangers already have three kits. And it might be a little easier to sell the need for a fourth if the team wore the orange third kit at some point. As yet, that hasn’t happened. Responding to a groundswell of anger over the £180 price tag for three Champions League home games and a perception that they failed to spend enough on quality players in the last transfer window, vice-chairman John Bennett and managing director Stewart Robertson gave carefully vetted interviews last week promising to stop taking fans for granted and listen a little more. ‘They’re our lifeblood,’ said Bennett. ‘It’s not just a phrase. They own the club.’ Asking the punters to shell out another £100 for a new kit for the kids this Christmas is a funny way of showing it. It’s not another kit Rangers need, it’s a set of new hearing aids for tone-deaf directors.