Between Ashley and the deep blue sea

A work colleague of mine happens to be a Rangers fan.  Now, it's a given that all Rangers fans answer any awkward question about the club with a loud shout of "We are the people!", but he's one of an increasingly large bunch of them who say it with an ironic grin.  He told me the other day how his oldest son, brought up as a Teddy Bear, has told him that he'd rather support Caley Thistle, as it was more enjoyable.  What an age we live in!

My colleague bought some shares in the club when they had that IPO a couple of winters back, the one that raised much of the money that has been subsequently pissed up against a wall.  His motivation for this was not profit (though that was his motivation when, several years previously, he actually bought Celtic shares!).  Part of it was loyalty.  Part of it was the opportunity to pitch up at the annual AGM.

He's taken a day off work to travel down from Inverness to Glasgow for this year's event, scheduled for Monday.  He did the same last year and had a whale of a time.  He's been looking forward to this one for weeks.  The entertainment on offer beats any Christmas pantomime.

And a pantomime it is...except, of course, for the lack of a hero.  There are, however, plenty of villains to go round, as I detailed in my rather successful 'A to Z guide to Newco Rangers' from a few weeks ago.  Auditioning for the role of Abanazar, whether they like it or not, are the current board, particularly the Easdale brothers, and Mike Ashley.

With most of the more dubious board members of the past two years having left the stage, James and Sandy Easdale seem, in the minds of the fans, to be the public face of the club's ownership...though, of course, the major shareholders are offshore hedge funds and companies who we know little or nothing about.  They are certainly the ones who stick their necks above the parapet most often.  And they put their money where their mouths are - Sandy provided an interest-free loan to help get the club through the summer.  Unfortunately, their reputation precedes them; Sandy was convicted of VAT fraud in 1997, and let's just point out again that, if you put "Easdales Rangers" into Google, one of the search engine's suggestions is 'gangsters'.

Whilst they've helped provide a life support machine for Rangers, the Easdales do not have sufficient cash to keep it going until the club has finally stopped haemorrhaging money; they need £8million of external funds to keep them going till the end of 2015, according to their recent accounts.  This is where Ashley, Sports Direct mogul and owner of Newcastle United comes in.  The regime at Ibrox previously gave Sports Direct a ridiculously favourable merchandizing contract which remains a nice little earner.  If he wants to continue milking that particular cash cow, he needs to prop the club up.

And so far, the evidence is that he is willing to do so - he increased his shareholding in October, and provided a recent loan to get Rangers through to the New Year in one piece.  A billionaire, he has more than enough cash to rescue them.  But the fans, who have so long hoped for a rich sugar daddy to come in and lavish his untold wealth on the playing squad (a la David Murray), know that this isn't Ashley's game.  That's because, at Newcastle, he's proven himself to be in it for the money.  If I was to guess, I'd say that, under Ashley, the Rangers team would be just strong enough to finish a distant second to Celtic in the league.  If that got 30,000 punters through the Ibrox turnstiles, and kept the shirt sales ticking over, that'd probably leave him with a nice wee profit.

But it probably wouldn't result in 'Zadok The Priest' being played over the tannoys in the near future.

But it's not a given that Ashley will take control; for a start, the SFA are already unhappy with his influence, which goes far beyond his 9% shareholding.  Their rules state that no-one can have significant influence over the running of two clubs.  Therefore, whilst he rules the roost at Newcastle, he can't do the same in Govan.  But one imagines that, if Ashley wants his way, a team of high-priced lawyers may be able to beat our governing body into submission.  And, if Rangers claim that Ashley is the only man who can prevent administration, would the SFA really put their foot down and potentially contribute to their collapse?

Add in the supporters' overwhelming hatred of him, though, and the cost of turning this shambles into a functioning business, and he may yet walk away.  Then what?  Who will save Rangers then?  The only other man wealthy enough to save the day, Dave King, has plenty of issues of his own, though his previous convictions in South Africa for tax evasion don't seem to upset Rangers fans particularly much.  It's worth noticing that, for all his bluster, King has never actually bothered to buy any shares - a simple, straightforward and, at the moment, cheap (18p each!) way to gain some influence.

So Rangers are, in effect, caught between Ashley and the deep blue sea.  Either he has his way, or there's probably no way back from the abyss.

So next week's AGM will be a hell of a show.  And that's without even mentioning, the warm-up act, a certain Mr McCoist, who will be worth the admission fee alone.

L.