We Tried to Warn You

21st June 2012 – Vladmir Romanov.
If ever acrid, bitter, rancid irony came back to haunt a club, the above
statement made by the Lithuanian madman to justify Hearts’ refusal to vote
Rangers’ newco into the SPL would probably be it.

As one of the first on the
anti-Rangers bandwagon, a bandwagon which was punctuated by greed, spite, hate,
pettiness and sheer vindictiveness, Hearts were assuredly forefront in their
moral indignation of the Ibrox side. It is true Romanov expressed sympathy for
fans of Rangers, but his scathing drivel about a football mafia and a
conspiracy against his club was as insane as it was unnecessary.

We tried to warn you. 

Last summer Rangers were dumped
into the third Division of the SFL, and just about every Rangers writer,
whether official or not including yours truly, warned the rest of Scottish
football that this vote had opened a black hole in the domestic game. An abyss
was being formed, and many lesser clubs such as Motherwell and Kilmarnock went publicly on record as fearing their
financial future. It was predicted that Rangers’ banishing would cripple
revenue for the SPL – just what do you do when you lose a massive source of
finance? The loss of thousands upon thousands of away supporters caused a deep
wound, and despite delusional SPL supporters defending the health of their
league, it was clear to anyone outside the country, and Rangers’ and our
supporters, that this was, in blunt terms, codswallop.

And now supporters of the Gorgie
half of Edinburgh
have to suffer the excruciating pain Bears had to last year.

            “The football mafia represented by
former owners of Rangers FC and Rupert Murdoch’s media are to blame for some of
the worst problems to hit Scottish football and must not be allowed back in
under any circumstances.”

Beyond the complete jibberish
from Mad Vlad here is the staggering condemnation of Sir David Murray, whose
tenure might not have finished in the most sparkling fashion but who did
nothing to merit this idiotic slur.

And now Romanov’s club is in
administration, the cause of which is financial mismanagement on a scale never
seen before in Scottish football. Detractors may try to point to Rangers’ EBT
scheme for comparison but it was vindicated in a court of law, while no court
of law would ever defend Romanov’s systematic refusal to pay his players on
time.

The number of jokes about the
Eastern Bloc businessman turning Tynecastle into Tesco illustrates just how
woefully Hearts have been run, and how clearly the rest of Scottish football
could see it.

Taking a pragmatic stance,
however it is fair to say that no decent Rangers fan (or any football fan)
should truly want Heart of Midlothian to die. Now, before angry readers protest
and suggest Hearts made their own bed here, hear me out;

It is true that their insane
owner was the first to leap up and down over Rangers’ troubles. It is true that
a huge majority of SPL fans wanted Rangers’ cast to oblivion last year. It is
also true that there was plenty of poisonous hate from the Jambo faithful. And
it is ultimately true that karma has bit them where it hurts.

However, if Hearts become the
second SPL club to crumple as a result of the first, then the end truly will be
nigh for Scottish football – if two of its largest clubs fall out of the SPL
it, while proving us observers right from the word go, will spell the beginning
of the end for the game in this country.

“Good riddance” I hear
you cry. Some Rangers fans might even want that. I probably counted myself as
one of them last year while the bitter aftertaste of the club’s treatment
lingered persistently. However, nowadays, the problem is if Scottish football
falls:

Where do Rangers go?

As written many times, England will not
accept Rangers and the Atlantic League is never going to happen.

There is nowhere to go. We are
stuck here.

It is in the interests of Rangers
that Scottish football does not die – the only small hope Rangers had for a
safe haven was the Blue Square Premier, but after the excitement in January of
the league’s chairman Brian Lee suggesting the move could be discussed ‘next
week’, nothing further was ever reported. Yet another false dawn and lame duck.

Rangers are stuck in Scottish
football, and it is in our interests that the likes of Hearts do not die.

However much hate there is, and
there is a lot, supporters have to rise above the small-minded pettiness that
came their way last year.

I am not on my high horse here –
I am not preaching to you all. You can feel whatever you want to feel and I am
unlikely to change anyone’s minds. But the truth is a great deal of the poison
going towards Hearts yesterday, while loosely justifiable, was exactly the same
as the hate from them and everyone else last year towards Rangers.

It is in Rangers’ and our fans’ best interests that Hearts survive. Not because we like the club or want them to be in good health necessarily speaking, but because if they flow into oblivion, then the fragile house of cards that is Scottish football will look perilously close to crumbling as a result – and because Rangers are trapped here, it includes us. If there was a way out I would gladly take it, but there simply is not.

This club and its fans suffered
horrendously last year. Is it really going to be an eye for an eye and the potential
meltdown of Scottish football including Rangers? Or will we rise above the
small-minded drivel which saw SPL fans preferring to see their own clubs going
bust than letting Rangers back in?

The choice is yours.