FAMOUS FIVE

TO the Four Just Men of Davie Provan, Andy Walker, Charlie Nicholas and Craig Burley, add my name. A sort of Famous Five, if you like.

Let me explain. The four former Celtic and Scotland men now  make their living commenting in the media, both on the airwaves and in newspapers.

And pretty frank and fearless they are. As recently as Sunday, in their newspaper columns, Provan and Walker were highly critical of much that has been going on at Celtic in the last few weeks.

But, in the comments posted on what had been written, Celtic supporters had another take on the insight these two highly informative and interesting observers provided. And that take was just one insult after another.

It's been the same for Burley, with what seems like  a special sort of loathing among those who follow Celtic reserved for one of the best players I have seen wearing their Hoops, Nicholas.

Unless I am mistaken it seems that nobody who ever played for Celtic is allowed to be critical of the club. Instead, in some sort of article of blind faith, they should be cheerleaders for the club, no matter what. Which is not, as any old hack would tell you, the job of a journalist.

As it so happens, Provan is a particular favourite of mine, and I regard his column as one of my weekend highlights, to such an extent, that even when I was writing a Sunday newspaper column I would freely admit mine was merely the second best on the Sabbath.

There was even one glorious spell when I knew that if wasn't giving Berti Vogts a deserved going over in my column, Provan would be taking care of him in his.

Not that I agree with everything in every one of his columns, or with all the views Walker, Nicholas and Burley express. But, as someone with a passionate belief in free speech and democracy, I will defend the right of those with whom I disagree to have a voice.

By all means, disagree. Please debate. Even argue. But there is a limit, and unfortunately there are those out there who have no wish to merely disagree. No desire to debate. Nor even an apptitude for arguement.

However, at least those who can't just disagree, debate or argue, and who are of a green and white, hue only appear to go potty with their four former players when one, or all, of them have a critical comment to make about the Parkhead club.

I though, seem to be in a class of my own, inviting the most vile, and at times seemingly uneducated bile from a section of the population, no matter what my subject matter may be.

Never was this more obvious than over the last few days, in the wake of my blog which sought to put into context what happened when Rangers played in the UEFA Cup Final in Manchester in May 2008.

At first the comments came from many who had been there, and shared incidents they and people they knew had been involved in or witnessed, with many adding that they joined me in deploring the moronic minority who behaved in such a deplorable fashion.

Later  came the abuse, much of which brought a wry chuckle, given the seemingly low level of education and intelligence which marked it. Though of course it could well have come from professional people trying to disguise their status.

Such was the case in the past when a colleague suffered threats. When he called in the police they traced the culprit to a £300,000 house in the leafy suburbs.

I wonder where this particular electronic trail will lead as Strathclyde's finest follow it,  after one comment posted contained the threat that I would be shot.  It will  be interesting to watch the police investigation progress.

MANCHESTER MYTH

THERE was nothing more certain, than when Rangers were paired with Manchester United in the Champions League, it would spark of a feeding frenzy in the press.

When the draw was made I predicted, in a telehphone conversation with a friend, that Rangers supporters had better get ready for the badly reported events in Manchester in May 2008 to be repeated....

Over and over, and over, again and again

What even I could not predict though was that one newspaper - the Daily Mail since you ask - would go as far as to report  Greater Manchester Police could tell UEFA the match must only take place behind closed doors.

That was just about as irresponsible piece of journalism as I've seen for many a long day.

For instance,did the the Daily Mail suggest that this summer's T in the Park should take place behind closed doors? No! Yet there has been murder, mayhem and rape at this event. And less than half the people at it than there were Rangers supporters in Manchester for the UEFA Cup Final.

T in the Park went on again this year and there was more violence and drug peddling, just as there will be next summer. Maybe the Daily Mail will find there were a few Rangers supporters at the music festival and blame them for all the trouble.

Some of the coverage of the events in that city just over two years ago made me ponder - and wonder at decisions taken by desk-bound newspaper executives, despite input from journalists who were eye witnesses to many of the things which happened.

One paper which was willing to print eye witness accounts  by reporters and photographers on the ground, of the way some police officers behaved, was the Daily Record.

I had one experience myself of the attitude of Greater Manchester Police as I made my way back to my hotel, just after midnight. As I passed along Piccadilly my way was barred by the fierce sight of a line of police, fully kitted out in riot gear, and brandishing the sort of deadly looking batons Dixon of Dock Green never carried

This line of steel stretched across the street, preventing me getting to my hotel, and, not being too sure of any other route, I approached one of these scary looking riot police.

Now, as anyone who knows me would tell you, as opposed to some of my colleagues who go their work dressed as though ready for a shift  on a building site, it is my habit to look respectable.

So there I was, a suited and booted middle aged man, wearing a shirt and tie, approaching a policeman to ask how best to reach my hotel.

My reasonable request was met by a snarl, followed by the brandish towards me of a riot stick, which would have looked more at home on the streets of Paris in 1968, and topped off by his bark of, ''f**k off.''

Fortunately - and unusually for me - my UEFA press pass - a large and impressive document - was still hanging from my neck, just out of sight under my buttoned jacket which, stepping back, I undid.

When I motioned this pass to a prominent position ,and then said :''Excuse me officer, I am officially UEFA accredited,'' there was a quick double take and he  then told me of an alternative way to my hotel.

Now, needless to say, there are those of you who are wondering why this information did not appear in my column in the Sunday newspaper I worked for then.

Only now can I tell you that it was written in a column, which also deplored the action of the minority who caused the trouble, and the few who took advantage of it to loot a few shops.

I also wrote than I took the view that only when the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth  - and that included the actions and attitude of the police - was uncovered, could a final verdict be delivered.

Within an hour the sports editor was on the phone saying that no, he could not accept what I was saying.
Despite reading the accounts in that day's Record to him, and asking him to read them for himself, he laid down the law, and the column had to be rewritten.

To this day I am certain  only my UEFA accreditation saved me from a whack on the head from that angry  and aggressive riot cop, plus probably arrest when I came out of a coma.

How many other innocents, who didn't have my credentials, were battered by a police force which, in my view, gave every impression of being out of control?

Remember too Greater Manchester Police was leaderless, and in  state of shock after its chief constable had climbed to the top of a hill, swallowed a bottle of vodka, and committed suicide.

It is also worth nothing that by seven  on the Friday morning a senior policewoman was put in front of the nation's television cameras to show a soft side. It was classic spin. And it worked.

Now, nobody should mistake any of this as an apology for the morons who threw bottles at the televsion screens when they failed right at the start of the UEFA Cup Final. How did they think that was going to help the screens? As I said, morons.

Nor should it be seen as a defence for anyone who joined in with the senseless attack on the defenceless policeman, the pictures of which were shocking and sickening.

I hope the forces of law and order hunt down the last culrpit, and that they face the full Majesty of the law, and feel its full weight.

But, and this was the view of the leader of the local council in Manchester, only just over 1000 at the very most were involved. That is a little more than 1000 from 2000,000. Or, to put it another way, just one HALF of one per cent

Which is a lot less than the percentage of murderers, rapists and drug dealers who have been at the last two T in the Park events.

I am however, still wondering what was the motivation of my sports editor in denying me the right and journalistic freedom to write about what had happened to me.

It is something I would have liked to have discussed with him. Unfortunately, shortly after, he was sacked and the police called in to investigate his involvement in a £300,000 fraud.

There may be some who believe much of the reporting at the time of what did and did not happen in Manchester, which is now being repeated by people who were not there, is a bit of a fraud too.

MILLER and LLOYDS

TWO stories concerning cash and Rangers, which have emerged in the last few days, just do not seem to add up.

But, then again, very little of the monetary matters involving Rangers, and those bankers at Lloyds, has seemed to me to tally  in the last year.

The first thing to surface was the UEFA annoucement of just how well Rangers had been rewarded for their participation in last season's Champions League. The Ibrox coffers have welcomed almost £14m

And those figures were only what UEFA gave to Rangers, and made no mention of what the club may have made through gate receipts, corporate hospitality and other bits and pieces at the three home matches last season.

The other tale which is being played out at the moment ,concerns Kenny Miller and what Rangers have offered him by way of an extension to keep him at Ibrox beyond the end of his current deal, which expires at the end of this season.

Those with the inside track at Ibrox say  - and I believe them - that Miller is being asked to take a wage cut, which hardly seems  the way to reward a striker who had his highest ever season's goal tally last time out.

Which brings us back to those bankers at Lloyds. And to Walter Smith's assertion it is those bankers who are running Rangers. Which leads many people to suspect they may still be keeping a tight hold of the purse strings and preventing Rangers  making the sort of offer to Miller they would wish to.

Such things will always be shrouded in mystery, as any approach to the bank for information would be met with the stonewall of ''customer confidentiality.''

Rangers though, as the customer, have the right to waive such protection and to come clean about just what degree of  influence Lloyds may or may not have. The club's Annual General Meeting would be the correct place to make such a statement.

There may also be a case for the Rangers Trust to approach the Lloyds Shareholders' Association in order that when the bank, which is 40 per cent owner by the British taxpayer, holds its AGM ,questions may be asked from the floor, and names named.

If, as so many media outlets tell us, Rangers are cash-strapped, then where is all of their income going? And surely it makes sense for Lloyds to reduce the club's debts in stages? After all, that £14m of UEFA money will be followed by even more - perhaps as much as £16m - for participation in this season's Champions League.

Therefore there can surely be no suggestion that, as a business, Rangers face the immediate prospect of their income drying up.

So, just who is calling the shots for Lloyds as far as Rangers are concerned? For, while Donald Muir is seen as the man who sits on the board with a watching brief for them, he appears to remain no more than a functionary.

 It is inconceivable that - in world terms - such a small business as Rangers will have attracted the personal attention of Lloyds 59-year-old Montana born Chief Exectutive, Eric Daniels.

However, the bank's Chief Risk Officer, Carol Sargeant, as her title perhaps indicates, may have taken a look at Rangers to see if the debt they owe is a good risk, while the executive member of the Lloyds board, whose title is Board Representative for Scotland, 58-year-old Archie G Kane, must be a man with an intimate knowledge of Scotland's businesses - Rangers included - and be in a position to give his advice.

There are questions though as to what role another senior man at Lloyds, whose name is not so readily available, David McEwan, has played, or does play. Whether or not he took a hard line at one stage is a matter for debate. Another name which has stayed underneath the radar is Ian Cruickshanks.

Whatever the level of Rangers debt to Lloyds is when revealed in the soon to be published Ibrox accounts, it is certain to be less than it was last year.

The repayment already made, plus the interests payments on the outstanding debt, also made by Rangers to the bankers, has contributed to Lloyds making a profit in the first half of this year of £1.6BILLION, with expert analysts forcecasting an annual profit of £4BILLION, plus the accumulation of a massive cash pile of around £10BILLION by 2012.

All of which puts the piddling £20 million or so owed to Lloyds by Rangers into sharp contrast, and makes me wonder why nobody else has had the wit to link the week's two cash stories concerning Rangers. And to do a little research into the bankers who, according  the Rangers manager, are running the club.

GENTLEMEN PLEASE!

WHEN I lanuched this blog a couple of weeks ago, one of the things I looked forward to was hearing from you.

And, if you recall, after asking  you to post your comments, I made a plea for good behaviour. For reasoned remarks. For views untainted by blind bigotory.

I have never had any problem with people who don't share my own views. Jeez I've even got a buddy who, at best ,could be described as an anarchist. And a few pals, who claim to be music lovers, but who are into that pathetic three chord trick called rock 'n roll. And me an old jazzer.

But what I find hard to tolerate is intolerance. If you see what I mean. Unfortunately there have been a few comments posted which fall well short of heeding the advice I mentioned, which my old Grandad once gave me....

KEEP THE PARTY CLEAN!

Now I know not everybody thinks Jim Baxter was the best player who ever played for Rangers and Scotland.

And there are many out there  who have failed to favour my long running campaign for Billy McNeill to be knighted.

What I do know though is this..... it would be a queer old world if we were all the same. If we all believed in the same things, liked the same players and listened to the same music.

In fact, if there is anybody out there who agrees with everything I write, then allow me to advise them to see a doctor. Don't delay!

So keep on sending me your comments. But maybe those of a green and white persausion can accept there have been some pretty good players who have worn the Rangers jersey, while, those on the other side of the great divide can acknowledge there have been a few good 'uns in green and white.

Gentlemen .....and ladies, do not devalue by ill disciplined ranting or intemperate language, any points you may wish to make, either in favour of what I have written, or in taking me to task.

However, when it comes to the matter of Jim Baxter being the greatest player ever for Rangers and Scotland, it isn't worth anyone's time putting forward a contrary view. I'm not listening.

McGREGOR and LAFFERTY

IT was only a matter of minutes after Allan McGregor's attempt at feigning injury that my phone blipped with a message from an old Maryhill mate who was watching the action in his home deep in the heart of the Home Counties.

His take on the incident was summed up in three words - McGregor an embarrassment - and after I  watched what happened again a few times again, it is a view with which surely nobody could disagree.

What the Rangers goalkeeper did was even harder to understand given the unfavourable publicity and two match ban which came Kyle Lafferty's way following a similar display by him, which resulted in Charlie Mulgrew, then of Aberdeen, being sent off.

McGregor has been luckier than Lafferty in that the referee dealt with his action at the time, by way of a yellow card, therefore no further punlishment is possible under football's laws.

Returning to Lafferty, and the Northern Irishman has been a hate figure, subjected to continual abuse from opposition supporters as a direct result of what he did.

Maybe McGregor, who has had more than his fair share of some vile abuse because of some of his off the field exploits - real and imagined - actually thrives on being in such a harsh spotlight and didn't mind giving ammunition for more, which he soon got  from angry Hibs fans. And who could blame them?

That is a pity, for McGregor is a fine goalkeeper, the best to have provided the last line at Ibrox since Andy Goram was in his pomp, and the save he made in the first half was from the top drawer.

As for Lafferty? Well on the opening day of the season he impressed against Kilmarnock and I remarked that there appeared to be a new maturity and discipline about his play. No more lunatic lunges, dodgy diving or petted-lip petulance.

He also appeared to have learned how to move the ball in a tight situation to create both the angle and space to deliver telling crosses.

Within minutes of the start on Sunday I suspected he was falling back to his bad old ways as he tried to take on two defenders, when a pass was preferable, and lost possession.

Therefore I was hardly surprised when, as half time approached, Lafferty launched an unnecessary and reckless looking tackle which prompted Hibs' Kevin McGuire to thump the ball off him, in turn leading to the Rangers man retaliating and both being sent off.

It was interesting to hear Walter Smith's take on Lafferty's involvement, saying that the player must learn from mistakes and that it something he will have to look at. He must, according the Rangers manager, adjust and discipline himself better than he has in the past.

Seasoned observers of the veteran boss feel that is Smith-speak for a dressing down for his player, and maybe even further than Smith has ever ventured in public by way of critical comment about a Rangers player.

If Lafferty can summon enough nous to ponder on what Smith said, take note of it and change  - to produce what he did against Kilmarnock and not against Hibs - then there is a player in there who can be of good service to Rangers and light up all of Scottish football with a rare talent.

If not , he is a liability to a club which is operating this season with the smallest squad in its recent history. Had McBride not been sent off - and with Iain Brines in charge it can be hard to predict what will happen - Rangers would have been seriously disadvantaged and may not have won.

McGregor and Lafferty should also remember there are plenty of people out there - row upon row of them in the ranks of the media, many of whom were in the Easter Road press box - who just cannot wait to knife Rangers.

Therefore, on a morning when the papers should have been full of good things about a 3-0 Rangers win over Hibernian in Edinburgh, newspapers - as was proper in a news evaluation sense - plastered headlines about the behaviour of the two Ibrox men, with McGregor, again quite correctly, singled out for the lion's share of bad publicity.

Mentions of  a superb hat trick from the always admirable Kenny Miller - a player who I have admired since first seeing him in a Hibs jersey - were pushed down the page.

As was a proper appreciation of Vladimir Weiss, whose contribution after coming on as a substitute looked to have solved what Smith referred to as the search he has conducted for almost four years for a real and natural touchline operator.

There were other plus points too, namely the way James Beattie so intelligently and deftly set up Miller's opening strike, and the stronger Steve Davis grew in his central midfield role as the game went on, culminating in his peach of a pass for Miller to complete his hat trick

Beattie looks as though he is another month away from reaching full match fitness, and when he adds a wee edge to it to compliment his astute football brain and neat touches, Rangers supporters can expect him to make a growing contribution.

Whether or not Lafferty also makes a contribution depends on his attitude to what Smith has said he must do, though I would not be in the least surprised if Rangers decided he has been given as many chances to mend his ways as is possible, leaving him with a lifetime to regret not making the most of fulfiling his boyhood dream of playing for Rangers.


........And there's more

I couldn't help but being a bit surprised at a paragrah in Her Majesty's Daily Telegraph about Liverpool agreeing a £25,000 deal to take Portuguese striker, Iaia Embarlo  to Anfield from Oldham. Embarlo is just 14-years-old. They'll be putting the weans up chimneys next.

JIMMY REID and MARTIN O'NEIIL

AT first glance it is far from obvious what the link is between the late Jimmy Reid and former Celtic manager Martin O'Neill.

However, both have been lionised and mythologised to such an extent they  could  almost be placed in the same category as Camelot and the Loch Ness Monster.

In commenting on Reid I will be forced to break an instruction handed to me more years ago than I care to remember by my old Presbyterian granny, who told me never to speak ill of the dead.

But it is not as much a case of directing ill will at the memory of the old Communist Red Clydeside firebrand, as putting him into the sort of context which has been missing from media coverage of his death and funeral.

First, the absurd notion that his 1972 speech, on being installed as Rector of Glasgow University, was the greatest since Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.

The subject of Reid's speech was freedom, at a time when he was a member of the Communist Party, and when memories were fresh of how the tanks of the Communist Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics had rolled into Prague to crush any notion of freedom there.

Placing what Reid said ahead of any number of Winston Churchill's calls to arms, in  real rallying cries for freedom, is even more utterly absurd than comparing his speech to what old Abe said so succinctly.

And then there were those eulogies about Reid the journalist, in which the writers appeared to be suffering from selective amnesia, failing to mention what many in the old inky trade at the time though actually defined Reid.

It was when ,at the height of Margaret Thatcher's power, Reid joined the then hard line Thatcherite Sun as a £25,000-a-year columinst - nearly £100,000 at today's values.

Of course, politcally, Jimmy Reid had a coat of many colours. After standing as a Communist and failing to be elected he moved to the right and joined the Labour Party, but still could not get elected, before finally ending up as a member of the Scottish National Party.

Watching television coverage of his funeral - a humanist service - I was reminded of another such service I attended three years ago.

It was for a journalist I had known since we were both 17, and who was a drinking buddy of the old Red Clydeside firebrand, Evening Times sportswriter, Alan Davidson.

Reid spoke, and his lecturing tone about the evils of drink offended many, myself included. We all knew big Alan took a good bucket, but his funeral service, with his grieving family sitting in the front row, was hardly the time and place to talk about it.

Fortunately for Reid's own grieving family, none of the oratory at his funeral alluded to the fact  he too could lower more than was good for him, and, having spent many a night in the same company as him, I can vouch for that.

And so to the Blessed, a man I must confess I grew to like very much when he was in Glasgow, and who always treated me with courtesy and respect.

Let there be no doubt,  O'Neill was a fantastically successful Celtic manager, but the depth to which the club had sunk by the summer of 2000 when he arrived, has perhaps coloured and distorted the perspective of what he achieved.

First, there is the claim that when O'Neill was manager, Celtic dominated Scottish football. It's true, in his five seasons in charge, Celtic won the title three times. Rangers triumphed twice, both championships won with Alex McLeish in charge.

It is also true he became the first Celtic manager since Jock Stein to win the Treble, achieved in his first campaign. But Rangers too managed to eclispse their rivals completely, and the 2003 Treble collected by McLeish came in direct opposition to O'Neill.

McLeish also won the first two trophies realistically available to him after he took over at Ibrox in December 2001, the League Cup and the Scottish Cup, beating O'Neill's Celtic in the semi final and final of the tournaments.

None of which give O'Neill's Celtic any sane claim to domination during that period. It is a fact that in his five years in charge O'Neill won seven trophies, exactly the same total achieved by McLeish in the shorter time of four and a half years.

In fact O'Neill's record as a Celtic manager does not stand comparision with his successor, Gordon Strachan who, on the sort of meagre budget restrictions O'Neill never had to operate under, and without anything like the same day to day control of the club the Ulsterman enjoyed, won three titles in four seasons.

There was also the significant matter of Strachan's Celtic qualifying for the last 16 of the Champions League twice, a feat O'Neill, for all his big spending, could not manage even once.

Returning to Reid, and many of the people I have spoken to who were on the inside of  the trade union movement during the time when he fronted the UCS work-in , were of the view that the real power belonged to the man who was the architect of the victory, Jimmy Airlie.

I once met Airlie socially and was impressed by his quiet authority, utter lack of ego and ability to listen to others.

 Airlie gave no hint as to whether he resented the way his contribution had been overshadowed Reid's celebrity, and the cash rewards which came with it, just as Strachan has never spoken of the lack of credit and respect he received from Celtic supporters for the greater success he gave them, compared to the deification of O'Neill.

Camelot and Loch Ness put together can just about match the myths attached to Reid and O'Neill.

ENDS 

GORDON SMITH

IT was great to bump into Gordon Smith in the media room at Ibrox on the opening day of the season.

He was at the match, having dug out his old broadcaster's hat, to resume his duties for the BBC Scotland team covering the Rangers-Kilmarnock game.

Of course it will be a plus factor for those who tune into the Beeb - and who would want to listen to any other station? - as Smudger's insight and forthright views are always worth listening too...even when you disagree with them ,as I often have.

However, there is a degree of disappointment in seeing him back on the media gallery as opposed to the more comfortable seats in the directors' box, where he perched during his all too brief spell as the chief executive of the Scottish Football Association.

It was a source of some mystery to me why so many of my press colleagues took against him from the moment his appointment was announced.

One daily newspaper reporter even shook his head in disbelief when he broke the news to me inside a ground on the outskirts of Vienna, where we were to watch a Scotland side, managed by Alex McLeish, take on Austria in a friendly.

For years we hacks - and some wee hacks too - had been screaming for a football man to be installed as the SFA supremo, and those shrieks were at their loudest during the disastrous tenure of David Taylor.

Yet, as soon as a guy who played at the top level, who had coaching experience at the top level, who operated as an agent for top players, and who knew how the media worked through his time on BBC radio and television, got the job there were howls of derision.

My reaction was one of  both welcome and a guarded optimism, tempered by a worry that Smith's background would work against him being accepted in some quarters.

As part of his background was a spell, at Rangers, during a playing career which saw him appear for, among others, Kilmarnock, Manchester City and Brighton,  the source of of any discontent about him should not be hard to work out.

But in all the dealings I have had with the man, I have always been impressed by the depth of his knowledge and understanding of the game, and even more to the point, of human nature, and his utter even handed approach.

It was not long though until whispering campaigns started by shady people who operate in the shadows, and to be fair, Smith did himself less than justice with some of his public statements.

The appointment of George Burley to succeed  McLeish, was hardly his finest hour, and the press conference to announce Burley's appointment turned into a farce when president George Peat and Smith highjacked it and got into an unseemly verbal brawl with the media.

Burley looked bewildered, though we were soon to discover that was a common state of mind for him, especially when Scotland were playing.

But he was not the first - nor will he be the last - SFA chief executive involved in appointing the wrong man as Scotland manager.

Unlike Taylor before him with Berti Vogts through, Smith was instrumental in removing Burley before he could do as much damage to Scotland's reputation as the German had managed.

It was after that though that Smith started to live on borrowed time, and when president Peat forced through the appointment of Craig Levein early this year,  those of us in the know held our breath for a departure we knew must come soon.

Smith had been Peat's favoured man for the chief executive job, and when the president insisted on Levein taking over the Scotland job - a decision which I continue to fail to see the logic of - - the former Dundee United manager soon became the president's favoured ''son'' at Hampden.

The bad blood which existed between Smith and Levein has been well enough chronicled, and despite the pipe of peace they smoked in public, most observers agreed they could find it hard to work together.

Not  for a moment do I believe that Levein had anything to do with Smith's departure, as even before the new national team boss entered Hampden, there were rumours a whispering campaign against the chief executive at a high level, from some who it was believed might have resented his background as a former Rangers player.

Though I have no evidence to suggest there was ever any such tittle tattle to to try to undermine former Celtic chairman Jack McGinn's time as president of the SFA, a time which was actually extended by a year beyond the normal occupancy.

No doubt any behind the scenes politicising in the Hampden corridors of power, which may have gone on in the late winter and early spring months of this year, will become public some day. Some day soon, I hope.

Until then, those who tune into BBC Radio Scotland will once again be given a splendid insight into what's going on by Smith.

The press box may not be as comfortable as the directors' box, but it's a lot more fun. And Gordon will also benefit from the bonus of meeting a better class of people there.

MURRAY'S RETURN?

SIR DAVID MURRAY could well be poised to make a dramatic return to the chairmanship of Rangers for a second time.

That is one conclusion which may be drawn from the revelation from Portsmouth that it is with Murray they have been negotiating over Rangers attempts to sign striker Tommy Smith.

Yet, amazingly this bombshell news was buried away, halfway down a story in Tuesday's Daily Mail, rather than given the sort of prominence an old newshound such as myself would have made sure it had.

However, even these ageing old eyes are still sharp enough to spot something which is newsworthy - one definition of which is something which is not already known.

The story came from Portsmouth administrator Andrew Andronikou, and the fact that he is the administrator, and not someone usually involved in football may explain his straight talking and the candid nature of what he said, as opposed to much of the double talk which forms a part of the game at managerial and boardroom level.

For those of you who missed the story what Andronikou said was this: ''We have agreed a fee with David Murray at Rangers.''

And those few words is what made the story newsworthy, for, as far as everyone has been aware, despite remaining as the owner of the club, since resigning as chairman and from the board a year ago, Murray no longer has any participation in the day-to-day running of Rangers.

Certainly when manager Walter Smith made the declaration of his honestly held view last season, that Rangers were being run by Lloyds Bank, Murray's influence had not only waned, but actually disappeared.

That though came at a time when he had put Rangers on the open-to-offers list and was actively seeking a buyer for the club.

It can surely be no conincidence the news from Portsmouth that it is Murray was has agreed the fee Rangers will pay for Smith, comes at a time when it was also revealed the club remain on the open-to-offers list, despite Murray's statement last month that he no longer wanted to sell up.

Of course all of this could be nothing more than a coincidence.

Or it could be the straws in the wind which indicate that Murray may be tempted to take over the Rangers reins again, just as he did a few years ago when, after a period during which he remained on the board, but stood down from the chairmanship, he returned to the top.

Whether or not Lloyds Bank have, or will, play any part in what the make up of the Rangers board has or will be, is something else which is unclear.

One thing though which will happen should Murray return, is that the power of chief executive Martin Bain will diminish. There was a time when I would have agreed to that being a good thing. Not now!

 In fact I believe Bain's greater freedom to make decisions and his increased power since Murray left the board and the chair was filled by Alistair Johnston, who spends the overwhelming majority of his time in America, has been an extremely good thing for Rangers.

Those in the know tell me  many of Bain's better ideas, plus his desire to publicly defend Rangers from many of the outrageous slurs perpetrated against the club by many in the media - and by rival football organizations - were thwarted by Murray.

Certainly those close to Smith say the manager has absolute faith in Bain and, indeed, his presence as chief executive may even have played a part in Smith deciding to stay on for another season in charge.

Last year the club's AGM was not held until the unusually late month of November. It will be worth keeping a close eye on when the annual audited accounts are finally published, and when they are put before the shareholders for approval.

For the events immediately before the publication of the accounts, and in the period leading up to the AGM, could well provide more straws in the wind. Hints which can help observers determine whether or not Murray will return to the Ibrox board as chairman.

In alerting everyone, by floating that first straw, Portsmouth administrator Andrew Andronikou, has no doubt sparked off a debate.

Or at least his comments will do, now that I have realised the full import of his words and brought them to the attention of a wider audience.

ENDS

McGEADY

AIDEN McGEADY'S spew of bile over the dear green place which is my native city, was as predictable as it was preposterous and pathetic.

According to the Moscow bound former Celtic player, he had to get away from Glasgow because he was a hate figure who had been subjected to death threats.

Yet, according to one senior source of mine within Strathclyde Police HQ ,there is no record of McGeady ever making a complaint to them, or of them ever investigating any such  serious threat against him.

He also says  he was fed up with Glasgow and wanted to leave, and that it was nothing against Celtic, but Glasgow was the problem.

However, it is when he delves into murky waters that the situation becomes - as you might expect - muddied.
For he claims some fans hate everything Celtic stand for, and  - and I quote McGeady directly - ''Everything I stand for as an Irish Catholic, playing for Celtic.''

He went on to mention some of the places where he says the abuse is at its highest, these being, Ibrox, Tynecastle, Motherwell and Falkirk.

But it is the fact he mentions what Celtic stand for, and what he, as an Irish Catholic stands for, which has me baffled.

After all Celtic, as their Mission Statement, makes clear, hold no truck with any sort of discrimination. Does McGeady think Celtic stand for Irish Cathlolics? It will be interesting to see whether or not chairman John Reid and chief executive Peter Lawwell move quickly to dis-associate Celtic with their former player's inflamatory remarks.

I also wonder just what the reader who took offence at my light hearted reference to my granny being a Presbyterian, thinks of McGeady citing religion in such a way.

Funnily enough in the last quarter of a century I have never been aware of a greater intensity of abuse directed at Celtic players at Ibrox, Tynecastle, Motherwell and Falkirk than that hurled at Rangers players at Parkhead and the homes of those other three clubs.

Though when Rangers visit Easter Road the vilification from the Hibernian supporters usually exceeds all they have to suffer elsewhere, with the exception of the east end of Glasgow.

Not for a moment do I doubt that McGeady has met some uncouth and unpleasant types - whether they be Rangers fans, who abuse him because he played for Celtic, or members of the Tartan Army, who give him stick for turning his back on the land of his birth, and electing to play for a foreign country.

In this respect I sympathise with him. Just as I sympathised with Nacho Novo when the death threats he received were of a serious enough nature for him to call in the constabulary.

There was also the gutter chant from Celtic hordes directed at the Spanish player, which went :''I hope you die in your sleep Nacho Novo, hope you die in your sleep, I pray, Hope you die in your sleep Nacho Novo, with a bullet from the IRA.''

LOVELY!

Then there was DeMarcus Beasley, an Afro-American from the south side of Chicago - which as Leroy Brown tells us is the meanest part of town - who had his car firebombed, while Allan McGregor's motor was trashed too.

Mo Johnston - remember him? - was at such a risk from Celtic fans he had to have bodyguards, and go and live in Edinburgh. That's some price for any Keelie to have to pay.

On the park too it is Rangers players who have been more in the Old Firm hate firing line. Witness what happened in front of 60,000 people and a television audience of a couple of million to then Rangers captain, Fernando Ricksen when his face was cut and needed stitching after being smacked by a missile hurled from the Parkhead stands.

More than five years on and the culprit remains at large, perhaps even sitting in the same seat at Parkhead. Maybe the guilty man or woman is the same thug whose aim was good enough to fell referee Hugh Dallas at the Celtic shame game in 1999.

Put alongside all of that, the abuse McGeady was subjected to from the stands was pretty small beer, while what he may or may not have suffered  on the street - and I don't doubt he had some pretty hairy moments -pales into insignificance compared to what at least three Rangers players have had to put up with on and off the park in the last couple of years.

We have certainly moved a long way since the 1960s when Jim Baxter could you out on the toot in safety with Paddy Crerand, Mike Jackson and Billy McNeill.

Or since the late 80s and early 90s when I shared many a bottle of bubbly with Paul Elliott, Jackie Dziekanowski, Paul McStay, Ally McCoist, Stuart McCall and Dale Gordon in the upstairs piano bar in Victorias.

But back to McGeady. And in the arena where he should be judged - football - Celtic won't miss him. And if you don't want to take my word for it, then how about verdict of Giovanni Trapattoni?

The veteran and highly decorated Italian coach, now in charge of the Republic of Ireland ,no longer sees McGeady as a first choice. With no goals in McGeady's more than half a century of international appearances, you can see where Trapattoni is coming from.

ENDS

CELTIC CASH CRISIS

THE damage Rangers have done to Celtic by winning the last two titles became obvious today when the Parkhead accounts were published.

And while the near £6m of debt which was announced is nowhere as serious as the level of money owed by Rangers, it shows how important this season's championship will be for the future of both sides of the Old Firm.

Chairman, John Reid may have been - as the BBC described him - bullish about the loss, but it's well worth remembering a similar description of Sir David Murray's attitude during the years when Rangers were slipping towards their present predicament.

The voyage back is long and hard, and while the direct entry to the riches of the Champions League, achieved by Rangers last season and again this year, has gone a long way towards steadying the ship at Ibrox, there are still stormy seas to navigate.

But, however choppy the waters, it is a course which will not be open to the team which finishes at the top of the table next spring. Next year the champions will have to pre-qualify, making it harder to come out of the squall and dock in a safe haven.

Therefore Celtic, although their debt is smaller than that which burdened Rangers two years ago,  are not in as happy a position as the champions were even then. For at that time the solution was simply to win the next two titles, despite cutting costs, and the Champions League money would ride to the rescue.

For Celtic, even winning the SPL this time out does not guarantee those riches, and that presents a problem, especially at a time when there is a hint of them adopting Murray's old discredited and disastrous mantra of slapping  a tenner on the table for every fiver the other half of the Old Firm spends.

Finishing as runners up, however is unthinkable as that means having to go through the two prequalfying rounds which stalled Celtic's progress this summer. The odds on this season's champions making it into Europe's blue riband tournament will be long enough, let alone what they will be like for the runners-up making it through.

Celtic's plight can be traced back to 14 months ago when chairman Reid and chief executive Peter Lawwell took what proved to be the financially crippling decision to employ Tony Mowbray as the successor to Gordon Strachan.

Though there are many who believe the disgraceful attitude of a large - majority? - of Celtic supporters towards Strachan, which led to the vacancy being created in the first place, is at the root of Celtic's current plight. That veteran Parkhead watcher - writer and broadcaster Hugh Keevins - hit the nail on the head with his view that Strachan would never be accepted by the faithful, as he lacked Celtic DNA.

Strachan was often hounded by the crowd at Parkhead ,and even more so on the road, where the extreme and hard line element of the Celtic support is more vocally identifiable.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions ,and those Celtic fans who voiced their dis-approval of Strachan clearly thought their intent was for the good of Celtic .

However, what they have learned about is the law of unintended consequences. Perhaps if Strachan had felt more loved by Celtic supporters he may have stayed on after Rangers won the title in 2009, following his three in a row successes.

Had he done so, there would have been no Mowbray, and none of the extra costs incurred to unseat him, which have had such a devastating effect on Celtic's financial situation.

Or, as my old Presbyterian granny used to warn....beware of what you wish for!

........AND THERE'S MORE


POOR old Craig Levein. As though the tanking Scotland got in Sweden wasn't bad enough, the story about the scribbles on a piece of paper found in the team's dressing room, have held him and his backroom staff up to ridicule.

The Swedes, having undone Levein's Scotland with such ease, are now having a good old fashioned belly laugh at the national team's preparation.

However, it was something which happened back in Scotland the morning after the match which should be of even greater cause for concern for those who have the good of the Scotland team close to their heart.

Firstly, Levein chose to de-brief the Sunday newspaper journalists at the luxury country hotel where he stayed after the Scotland flight landed at Glasgow airport in the wee small hours.

Now I have been involved in similar briefings dating back to when Jock Stein was in charge, and including Andy Roxburgh, Craig Brown, Berti Vogts, Walter Smith, Alex McLeish and George Burley, and each time they held court it was on Scottish Football Association premises.

It was though, what Levein was reported as having said which was worrying, as he tried to explain away a defeat which carried much of the same stigma attached to the beatings in Wales under Vogts and Burley, and in Norway when Burley was in charge.

According to Levein, he was the least concerned of all about the defeat and its nature, with him going on to describe the 3-0 humiliation visited on his Scotland side as being akin to a club losing a pre season friendly.

If I may be so bold as to correct him. It is far from that. International friendly games are included in the complicated points structure put together by FIFA which determines Scotland's place in the world rankings, which in turn is included in the calculations of seeding when qualification for World Cup and European Championships come around.

It is defeats, such as the many suffered under Vogts, which saw a Scotland side ranked in the top 20 and seeded 2nd when he inherited it from Brown, slither to nearly 80th and nosedive to fourth seeds. Which is why we found ourselves in a section which included  then World Champions, Italy, beaten finalists France, and quarter finalists Ukraine.

Therefore the outcome of friendlies do not merely matter. They are vital for Scottish chances of ever reaching the finals of a major tournament again. Which is why the shrewd Smith took so few. Maybe if Levein had taken the trouble of going to work last Thursday, somebody at the SFA would have made that point to him ahead of his meeting with the Press, and saved him from making a similar verbal blunder to the one somebody on his backroomn staff committed to paper in Sweden.

ENDS

NEW SEASON

THE new season starts this weekend, and not a moment too soon. And Leggoland is back too. And not a moment too soon either.
It's the best part of a year and a half since Trinity Mirror Newspapers - owners also of the Daily Record, Sunday Mail, Daily and Sunday Mirror - pulled the plug on their sports coverage of Scottish football in the People.
There may be a few of you out there who followed my weekly Leggoland column for the best pasrt of 12 years in the People.
Certainly the 30 per cent drop in the circulation of the ailing paper in Scotland - the largest plunge if sales of any paper north of the border - since they axed Leggoland suggests there were plenty of folk out there who only bought the otherwise sad old rag for my column.
But that's the past. This is the present and the future. The way ahead, and the way more and more of you will be getting you news and views.
So, even though I've been around for just about as long as sin itself - more than 46 years in the news business - I'm still young enough to welcome this new journalism, and to embrace it.
However, although I will keep you all posted about what's going on behind the scenes in the weird and wonderful  of Scottish newspapers, television and radio, it's football which will be the main focus for this column.
Or, as I must get used to calling it in the world of the web, this blog!
So right away let's turn our attention to the coming campaign, which I reckon will be as interesting as any in history, as Walter Smith seeks to achieve what he failed to 13 years ago, and finish his time at Ibrox by winning the title, while Neil Lennon attempts to repeat the feat of Wim Jansen, and win the flag in his first season in charge at Parkhead, bringing the Rangers juggernaut to a shuddering halt.
Of course to many it appears that Smith and Rangers are not just facing billionaire owner Dermot Desmond and chairman John Reid and his establishment cronies, but also the bankers of Lloyds. Bankers, I say, bankers.
Lloyds, and just who the men behind the decisions which are handcuffing Rangers, will be the subject of a blog in the very near future.
Don't miss it when I name names. Bankers!
For the moment, and with the transfer window still open for another fortnight, it is hard to separate the Old Firm and much will hinge on how rookie manager Lennon copes with the weight of the stresses, strains and expectations of a fanatical support, especially now that Martin O'Neill is out of work.
There is also the formidable nature of the man Lennon is up against, Smith, whose shrewd eye will be carefully cast on Lennon, watching for any moment of weakness, and vulnerability, or sign that he is wilting under the strain.
It is the experience of Smith  and his calm rationale which is the most vital thing for Rangers as they attempt to make it three in a row - one of the hardest feats in Scottish football - as history testifies.
For instance, it's well known that when Gordon Strachan achieved what Martin O'Neill could not, it was the first time Celtic had managed it since Jock Stein during the Parkhead nine-in-a-row era.
What is possibly not as well known is that when Rangers hit title number three during the Ibrox nine-in-a-row run, it was the first time Rangers had managed it since the 1930s when Bill Struth ruled the roost.
Therefore, should Smith manage it he will be unique, as the only man to do it on two entirely separate occasions.
Do I think Smith and Rangers will do it? Just three weeks ago my reply would have been an emphatic NO! At that time Celtic were signing players as Rangers sold-sold-sold. But now there are signs that Smith will be able to wheel and deal.
I still believe the players who have arrived at Parkhead will strengthen Celtic from what they were last season when Rangers won the title by six points.
It may take Celtic a little time to settle and gell, and if Rangers can take advantage in that period, and build a lead, plus making the right sort of signings, things could get very interesting - and that's when we will all see just what kind of manager Lennon is.
So - and it's sore on the bum up here on the fence - I think I will reserve judgement on just who to tip for the title until the transfer window closes at the end of the month.
But stay with me and let me have your comments on my news and views. But - and please folks take note - no rambling rants. No bad language and NO BIGOTRY. As my old grandad used to say - keep the party clean.
.............AND THERE'S MORE.......
GOOD news and bad news on the television beat for the season ahead.
First, its good to hear that Sky have promoted one of the best broadcasters in Scotland, David Tanner, from trackside interviews when there's live Scottish football on the box.
Instead, David will be in the studio as the anchor, a job I am sure he will quckly grow into, and one he richly reserves.
 David cut his broadcasting teeth at Radio Clyde, and then STV, at a time when both organisations were less inclined to lean in a Parkhead direction than they do now.
The bad news? Well, Peter Martin Maguire, who quit the increasingly marginalised looking Radio Clyde, will take over the trackside interviewing dutiies on Sky from the promoted Tanner.
One of Martin Maguire's last outings on Clyde was on general election night when he and the bumpitious and bumbling Graham Spiers got into trouble for speculating on air about the voting intentions of Neil Lennon and Walter Smith while the polls were still open.
Which as any fule knows, is against the law, and led to Clyde warning both Martin Maguire and Spiers after OFCOM, the broadcasting watchdog censured the radio station.
Martin Maguire  and Spiers actually went as far as to endorse Labour, with Spiers saying he had voted for the Kirkcaldy minister's son.
So, not only did the ailing Times' football writer not know the law, he also appeared to be unaware of how our parliamentary democracy works.
For, as he lives in Aryshire, his vote would be for whoever stood in his local constituency, and not for someone who was standing in a constituency in Fife.
Just another example of why the Times, at least in Scotland, has lost it's reputation of being the paper of record since Spiers was edged out at the Herald and joined them.

That's all for now, but keep an eye on this site for all the latest.