Rangers deny administration rumours

Rangers have rejected internet rumours that the club will enter administration for a second time on Wednesday, but faced demands from supporters to answer claims that former chief executive Charles Green still has influence within the club.

A spokesman for the club said last night: “There is absolutely no truth in these claims [about the club facing administration], which appear to come from agenda-driven bloggers who are out to damage the club. There is no chance of administration while there is no board meeting tomorrow. This is all completely false.”

Rangers have rejected internet rumours that the club will enter administration for a second time on Wednesday, but faced demands from supporters to answer claims that former chief executive Charles Green still has influence within the club.

A spokesman for the club said last night: “There is absolutely no truth in these claims [about the club facing administration], which appear to come from agenda-driven bloggers who are out to damage the club. There is no chance of administration while there is no board meeting tomorrow. This is all completely false.”

Quite why these bloggers want to damage the club or what their agenda is remains unclear. I would be surprised to learn that they are Celtic fans.

The Union of Fans – a coalition group representing six supporter bodies – released a statement seeking clarity about what happened to the Yorkshire businessman’s 7.68 per cent stake in the club after he ended his second stint with the club as a paid consultant last August. It comes after former director Dave King spoke out at the weekend about his fears that it was “quite possible that Charles Green is still de facto controlling the club”.

King now plans to travel to Scotland from his base in South Africa to launch his bid for boardroom change after claiming his previous attempts to invest in the club in order to avert a planned downsizing of the budget were thwarted by the current Ibrox regime.

King’s intentions have been welcomed by the Union of Fans. They have also argued that the club should not just speak about but actually provide transparency. The difficulty is that if one does not, for example, provide access to the shareholders’ register, fans will, rightly or wrongly, suspect there is something to hide.

All sorts of institutions from hospitals to universities are required these days to disclose more than they had to in the past and to refrain from covering things up. These arrangements do not work perfectly, but the ‘world of football’ often seems to think it is outside them altogether.