Laughable Decision
Graham Spiers calls the Scottish Football Association laughable over its decision to confirm Dave King a 'fit and proper' person to run Rangers Football Club.
But the whole business has been a complete joke from start to finish, especially in light of the club's practice of paying key figures by making them 'loans' which never had to be repaid.
No one has paid a real price for this ridiculous state of affairs and now Rangers have a man at the helm who had his own widely publicised tax avoidance troubles in South Africa recently.
So while 'cracking on' might be the practical thing to do in the circumstances there's a whole bunch of people and organisations left looking ridiculous and toothless, not just the Scottish Football Association.
No one has paid a real price for this ridiculous state of affairs and now Rangers have a man at the helm who had his own widely publicised tax avoidance troubles in South Africa recently.
So while 'cracking on' might be the practical thing to do in the circumstances there's a whole bunch of people and organisations left looking ridiculous and toothless, not just the Scottish Football Association.
Spiers on Sport: A laughable decision, but now let Dave King crack on
By Graham Spiers - The Herald
Is anyone genuinely surprised that, in their fearful wisdom, the SFA has decreed Dave King to be "fit and proper" to become the chairman of Rangers?
By Graham Spiers - The Herald
Is anyone genuinely surprised that, in their fearful wisdom, the SFA has decreed Dave King to be "fit and proper" to become the chairman of Rangers?
I have to admit, I don't know one such person. It has seemed a stick-on for months that Scottish football's governing body would "pass" King fit, controversial or not.
In one sense it has been an academic exercise. King has taken control of Rangers and, fit or not in the eyes of the SFA, nothing was going to change that. King was going to wield his Rangers power, either inside the boardroom or outside its door.
In this context, it is time to crack on. Let's see what King can now do at Rangers. But not before we can examine just how laughable this SFA decision is about him.
There have been two parts to this King debate. The first has been what you might call the bleedin' obvious part. The second has been the area of intense legal dispute.
King, for many, blatantly failed the SFA's own rules about reputable characters coming in to Scottish football.
By reputable, the SFA meant a red flag over anyone who, say, has a recent court conviction for tax evading, or had been a director of a football club which had undergone insolvency within the last five years.
You can read the SFA's slightly laborious Article 10 if you like. It does not cite these various misdemeanours for fun, or for their appeal. On the contrary, the SFA cites them because it wants to guard against such characters invading the Scottish game.
It won't do here to wade back through Dave King's 41 guilty counts in a South African high court in 2013. Everyone knows about them. On the surface King blatantly fails the SFA's fit and proper process.
But there is a further aspect to this. These days everything - absolutely everything - is up for legal challenge. Every single moral bar can be turned on its head in a court of law. In this context, nothing is cut and dried.
In recent weeks there has been endless legal counsel and trading going on, both on the SFA side and the King side, as this fit and proper decision has been reached.
This is the main reason why the ruling has dragged on so long. It doesn't matter what appeared to be the case on the surface, or how ludicrously some of us viewed King's failure in terms of the SFA's Article 10.
The point is, the SFA had to be absolutely sure their decision was legally watertight. And these days next to no-one knows - not even prime ministers - what a legally watertight position is.
The SFA have been fearful of Dave King. Giving him fit and proper status is the easiest way out. It cuts out further months of potential acrimony and legal jousting, by just giving him his seat on the Rangers board.
The SFA will be damaged, and maybe even tarnished, by this King decision. It will seem laughable and deplorable in equal measure to many Scottish football fans up and down the country.
Supporters outwith the Rangers legions will no longer trust the SFA. They will view the organisation, instead, as supine, weak-willed, fearful and capitulating.
This King issue was a test-case for the SFA's reputation, and I don't think it has come out of it at all well. The governing body will be disparaged over it.
All of that being said, it really is time to crack on. There can be an unhealthy fascination with things Rangers by supporters of other clubs, and this King case for some has been just such an episode.
Rangers FC - "old" or "new", whatever your take - has gravely suffered. Never in anyone's wildest dreams was it imagined that the club would be liquidated. But it was, in 2012.
The pain and anger from that event still linger. The disputes about "Rangers", the club's history and all the rest of it, have been poisonous. To be abject about this, those who had always detested Rangers have surely had their fill.
Personally, I am all for Rangers FC moving on, being strengthened, being made healthy, and competing at the highest level in Scottish football. I believe it will enhance the game that we love in this country.
King is the latest to try to make that happen. He is here, at Ibrox, and no SFA fit and proper farce is going to change that.
Whatever your view of this King decision - and I find it ridiculous - it is time now to let him get to work, and let him be judged by what he can or cannot do for Rangers.
In one sense it has been an academic exercise. King has taken control of Rangers and, fit or not in the eyes of the SFA, nothing was going to change that. King was going to wield his Rangers power, either inside the boardroom or outside its door.
In this context, it is time to crack on. Let's see what King can now do at Rangers. But not before we can examine just how laughable this SFA decision is about him.
There have been two parts to this King debate. The first has been what you might call the bleedin' obvious part. The second has been the area of intense legal dispute.
King, for many, blatantly failed the SFA's own rules about reputable characters coming in to Scottish football.
By reputable, the SFA meant a red flag over anyone who, say, has a recent court conviction for tax evading, or had been a director of a football club which had undergone insolvency within the last five years.
You can read the SFA's slightly laborious Article 10 if you like. It does not cite these various misdemeanours for fun, or for their appeal. On the contrary, the SFA cites them because it wants to guard against such characters invading the Scottish game.
It won't do here to wade back through Dave King's 41 guilty counts in a South African high court in 2013. Everyone knows about them. On the surface King blatantly fails the SFA's fit and proper process.
But there is a further aspect to this. These days everything - absolutely everything - is up for legal challenge. Every single moral bar can be turned on its head in a court of law. In this context, nothing is cut and dried.
In recent weeks there has been endless legal counsel and trading going on, both on the SFA side and the King side, as this fit and proper decision has been reached.
This is the main reason why the ruling has dragged on so long. It doesn't matter what appeared to be the case on the surface, or how ludicrously some of us viewed King's failure in terms of the SFA's Article 10.
The point is, the SFA had to be absolutely sure their decision was legally watertight. And these days next to no-one knows - not even prime ministers - what a legally watertight position is.
The SFA have been fearful of Dave King. Giving him fit and proper status is the easiest way out. It cuts out further months of potential acrimony and legal jousting, by just giving him his seat on the Rangers board.
The SFA will be damaged, and maybe even tarnished, by this King decision. It will seem laughable and deplorable in equal measure to many Scottish football fans up and down the country.
Supporters outwith the Rangers legions will no longer trust the SFA. They will view the organisation, instead, as supine, weak-willed, fearful and capitulating.
This King issue was a test-case for the SFA's reputation, and I don't think it has come out of it at all well. The governing body will be disparaged over it.
All of that being said, it really is time to crack on. There can be an unhealthy fascination with things Rangers by supporters of other clubs, and this King case for some has been just such an episode.
Rangers FC - "old" or "new", whatever your take - has gravely suffered. Never in anyone's wildest dreams was it imagined that the club would be liquidated. But it was, in 2012.
The pain and anger from that event still linger. The disputes about "Rangers", the club's history and all the rest of it, have been poisonous. To be abject about this, those who had always detested Rangers have surely had their fill.
Personally, I am all for Rangers FC moving on, being strengthened, being made healthy, and competing at the highest level in Scottish football. I believe it will enhance the game that we love in this country.
King is the latest to try to make that happen. He is here, at Ibrox, and no SFA fit and proper farce is going to change that.
Whatever your view of this King decision - and I find it ridiculous - it is time now to let him get to work, and let him be judged by what he can or cannot do for Rangers.
