SDM and the Presidents Role

[GeneralCartmanLee 313]

He didn’t lose it, he spent it on players etc…..What do you think paid for the squad of internationalists we had at the time?

Over the years Sir David certainly can’t be criticised for attracting a lack of investment.

Have our investors put more money into the club than Murray.

Good question minstral, someone like bluedell may know, i would need to check. My gut feeling is overall Sir David put in more but i don't know for a fact.

[caseyjones 3,009]

He didn’t lose it, he spent it on players etc….

Joe Lewis did though, to the tune of £30m! Dave King's £20m investment must be worthless now too..

What do you think paid for the squad of internationalists we had at the time?

From what we keep hearing from many, Murray's personal fortune. Don't burst their bubble, GCL.

Over the years Sir David certainly can’t be criticised for attracting a lack of investment.

Who invested in us after ENIC and King had their fingers burned?

. .

[*Manticore* 1,893]

He didn’t lose it, he spent it on players etc…..What do you think paid for the squad of internationalists we had at the time?

Over the years Sir David certainly can’t be criticised for attracting a lack of investment.

Have our investors put more money into the club than Murray.

The fans certainly have.

And unlike murray, we didn't expect to get our money back out...

[GeneralCartmanLee 313]

He didn’t lose it, he spent it on players etc…..What do you think paid for the squad of internationalists we had at the time?

Over the years Sir David certainly can’t be criticised for attracting a lack of investment.

Have our investors put more money into the club than Murray.

The fans certainly have.

And unlike murray, we didn't expect to get our money back out...

No way Sir David is expecting his money back....

[GeneralCartmanLee 313]

He didn’t lose it, he spent it on players etc….

Joe Lewis did though, to the tune of £30m! Dave King's £20m investment must be worthless now too..

What do you think paid for the squad of internationalists we had at the time?

From what we keep hearing from many, Murray's personal fortune. Don't burst their bubble, GCL.

Over the years Sir David certainly can’t be criticised for attracting a lack of investment.

Who invested in us after ENIC and King had their fingers burned?

. .

Joe Lewis’s shares were bought back at an agreed rate, I think it was nominal sum and MIH had to pay further sums when Rangers reached certain milestones. Dave king will still hold shares so of course they will have a value but he won’t get anything near 20 million back that is for sure.

I have never suggested Sir David was the only investor or anyone else has invested in us after Lewis/King. Market conditions change and people have had there fingers burnt, it's no surprise no one else has invested. That it not simply Sir Davids fault though and at least he underwrote the share issue (although people will rightly point out that he should have done that)

[caseyjones 3,009]

He didn’t lose it, he spent it on players etc….

Joe Lewis did though, to the tune of £30m! Dave King's £20m investment must be worthless now too..

What do you think paid for the squad of internationalists we had at the time?

From what we keep hearing from many, Murray's personal fortune. Don't burst their bubble, GCL.

Over the years Sir David certainly can’t be criticised for attracting a lack of investment.

Who invested in us after ENIC and King had their fingers burned?

. .

Joe Lewis’s shares were bought back at an agreed rate, I think it was nominal sum and MIH had to pay further sums when Rangers reached certain milestones. Dave king will still hold shares so of course they will have a value but he won’t get anything near 20 million back that is for sure.

I have never suggested Sir David was the only investor or anyone else has invested in us after Lewis/King. Market conditions change and people have had there fingers burnt, it's no surprise no one else has invested. That it not simply Sir Davids fault though and at least he underwrote the share issue (although people will rightly point out that he should have done that)

I believe ENIC salvaged £8m of their original £40m investment.

[*Manticore* 1,893]

I believe ENIC salvaged £8m of their original £40m investment.

Toxic SDM strikes again.

[Bluedell 14]

He didnt lose it, he spent it on players etc….

Joe Lewis did though, to the tune of £30m! Dave King's £20m investment must be worthless now too..

What do you think paid for the squad of internationalists we had at the time?

From what we keep hearing from many, Murray's personal fortune. Don't burst their bubble, GCL.

Over the years Sir David certainly cant be criticised for attracting a lack of investment.

Who invested in us after ENIC and King had their fingers burned?

. .

Joe Lewiss shares were bought back at an agreed rate, I think it was nominal sum and MIH had to pay further sums when Rangers reached certain milestones. Dave king will still hold shares so of course they will have a value but he wont get anything near 20 million back that is for sure.

I have never suggested Sir David was the only investor or anyone else has invested in us after Lewis/King. Market conditions change and people have had there fingers burnt, it's no surprise no one else has invested. That it not simply Sir Davids fault though and at least he underwrote the share issue (although people will rightly point out that he should have done that)

Dave King holds no shares in Rangers. He only holds shares in MSL. If MSL sells its shares in Rangers then the cash goes to MIH to repay the loan in place, so Dave King's shares are effectively worthless.

Murray did well to get Enic and King to invest, but everyone can see that they got shafted in the process. NTL are another company that got into bed with us and got shafted for their £15m investment.

I'm surprised that JJB agreed to deal with us given our other partners/investors' experiences, and it has certainly put off other people.

[GeneralCartmanLee 313]

Dave King holds no shares in Rangers. He only holds shares in MSL. If MSL sells its shares in Rangers then the cash goes to MIH to repay the loan in place, so Dave King's shares are effectively worthless.

Ah...cheers....

[Bluedell 14]

I believe ENIC salvaged £8m of their original £40m investment.

A better return than NTL though. They salvaged £1 for their £15m investment.

[caseyjones 3,009]

I believe ENIC salvaged £8m of their original £40m investment.

A better return than NTL though. They salvaged £1 for their £15m investment.

Cheers for the info.

Good old 'Honest' Dave.

[Jimfanciesthedude 24,613]

you'd think listening to some people on here that murray sold everything that wasnt fucking bolted to the floor

in my opinion a football club is measured on success, nothing else

and in murrays reign we have had unrivaled success,

yes he has made mistakes, in 2 decades of power i'd fucking expect him to

we've been in supposed financial trouble twice apparently, both times we still managed to attarct players of enough quality to win 4 titles from 9 (taking it from o'neills first season)

we've also had numerous domestic honours, euro final, champions league football, european trips after xmas

its not like we've stripped te club to the bare bones like killie, aberdeen etc are doing/have done

yes financially it could be better,

BUT DONT WE SLAG THE BEGGARS FOR HAVING A BETTER BALANCE SHEET THAN TEAM???????????????????????????

[jimgers 565]

The poll does not lie, the Majority of supporters want SDM as life president. Continualy snipping at him makes us look petulant or worse behaving like the shameless ones we despise for their backing stabbing, revisionist paranoia.

[Bluepeter9 5,167]

Good God....

Some arguments just wont quit.....

David Murray came in to Rangers, continued the revolution that had been kicked off when Souness was brought in and provided the leadership that wound up with 9 in a row. He might not have personally paid for it but he took a hand in it that you, me and any other Rangers supporter would liked to have done, if we were lucky enough to have the means....

He had never been a football man and he was never a Rangers man....

He took the club on for reasons only he can communicate but probably won't because his detractors will only call him a liar anyway. As an independent, non football, non Rangers, business man he set about to tackle an element of our support that he felt needed tackled... his detractors will disagree.... he also maintained his business characteristics and made sure that a lot of the contracts being awarded by Rangers went to other group companies thus keeping the money "in-house" among his business empire... he has not asset stripped the club otherwise people wouldn't be looking to acquire it... by directing such contracts he was of course looking after his own interests, he was entitled to do so.

He was partially responsible for breaking down barriers by sanctioning the signing of Mo Johnston and he will have alienated an element of the support in so doing

He has been woeful at defending the club against character assassinations probably largely due to his belief that some of those attacks were somehow justified and partly due to him trying to observe some sort of dignified silence. He should have defended our rights to sing some songs and he should have challenged outright lies that were told.... However no-one can expect him to come out and defend "ftp's" and make any statements on terrorism in NI.

He is undoubtedly guilty of financial mis-management of the club but how any supporter can not sympathize with that is beyond me. He clearly believed that by speculating (with the clubs, money not his own) he could accumulate... the revolution he was party to along with Souness was fuelled by the English clubs being banned from European competition and being able to sign big English names.... then when the premiership was in its infancy he obviously believed he could continue to compete at that level and spent to try and keep up.... that the EPL left us in their dust was hugely unfortunate but given that we were one of the driving forces behind the Champion League format he perhaps clung to the hope that this would provide the vehicle to feed our hungry finances..... alas, it too, left us in its wake....

Rangers current plight is entirely down to Murray's reckless spending, but his reckless spending only appears reckless with hindsight.and who is not an expert with the benefit of hindsight. He took over in the "loadsamoney" years of excess in the late 80's.... his ego fuelled ambition continued it through the nineties and the last ten years have been consolidation....

My opinion, is that he has been disappointing as a chairmen on a number of levels and he has held the chair during some of our most successful years, as long people try to polarize his contribution into "he gave as 20 years of success" or "he has lead us to financial ruin" then this discussion will go round and round. It always seems to be the same on here, you are either a Murray Hater or a Murray lapdog, life is just not that black and white.

There have been many people who have contributed to our successes and to our failures.... the Managers who gratefully spent the big money, the managers who worked on a budget, the players who were paid the money and did little to justify it and the ones who shone, the country in which we are destined to compete and the man who was at the helm the whole time...

However what seems to have been overlooked, is that this Presidency talk was not started by the fans, nor by David Murray. Rather it was started by our potential new owner. Who has looked through the figures and has carried out in depth analysis of our finances and of our assets and of our commercial history. He seems to feel that Murray deserves to be honoured and surely that must say something about what he has found during the due diligence?

Murray has been an average chairman and owner, he is about to be an ex-owner and I personally see no benefit to anyone for him to be bestowed with any honorary title. Onward and Upwards

A very well-balanced piece.

... apart from the fact that it was missed out the amount of Money that was put in to clear the initial rounds of debt (£50M) from him and his groups of companies.

His companies, not him And, that was due to the fine mess that his recklessness had got us into in the first place

Also 20 years is a long time never to have made mistakes and also given our sucess, never to have got some things right.

I dont rember much critisism of his spending tillafter football changed and the anticipated TV money did NOT come our way.

20 years is a long time, and while I am an SDM 'suppporter' I am far from thinking everything he done was perfect, but on balance (for me) he has done enough to warrant this proposed honour. (One thing always made me nervous about any one man propping up losses in the club was what would happen in a downturn! - we survived! Portsmouth are barely alive, West Ham were 'lucky' their new owners took over, Leeds crashed SDM brought us 6 trophies and looked for new owners)

Just to anotate

But until recently Murray also owned 80% of those company shares, just refinanced MIH and still owns in the region of 74% (cant be arsed looking at specifics - no doubt I'll be a fraction of a % out and some idiot will have a go) BUT to all intents and purpose that makes it his money!! (and why he was able to do it) - OH and YES he does have a lot of debt in those companies but I am sure a lot of people have a lot of debt in the form of the mortgage in the theri house but that doesnt stop them saying they own the house

[bluepeter 5,627]

Interesting that the most vehement posts in the thread are atrongly anti-Murray, yet the poll has never been less than 70% in favour of the title. I can only assume it's a vocal minority. That's not meant as a dig at anyone, we're all entitled to our opinions. I'm glad the majority can see that it's not all been bad under Murray

[caseyjones 3,009]

Interesting that the most vehement posts in the thread are atrongly anti-Murray, yet the poll has never been less than 70% in favour of the title. I can only assume it's a vocal minority. That's not meant as a dig at anyone, we're all entitled to our opinions. I'm glad the majority can see that it's not all been bad under Murray

No, it's not all been bad, there have obviously been highs along the way. However, when you consider that the club and it's fans were pilloried in the media on a regular basis, safe in the knowledge that there would be no comeback from Sir, so long as thex didn't target him or Bain, added to the financial mess that he has put us in, twice, then some people are going to be critical of his tenure as a whole.

His whole time here was blighted by short-term thinking and fire fighting whenever a problem arose.

[MrSifter 181]

No, it's not all been bad, there have obviously been highs along the way. However, when you consider that the club and it's fans were pilloried in the media on a regular basis, safe in the knowledge that there would be no comeback from Sir, so long as thex didn't target him or Bain, added to the financial mess that he has put us in, twice, then some people are going to be critical of his tenure as a whole.

His whole time here was blighted by short-term thinking and fire fighting whenever a problem arose.

I agree with the above. The only time he didn't fire fight was when the Club's name, players and fans were being defamed.

Something we all forget is that many turn up to the games and want to see Rangers win. Beyond that they have no involvement or real interest beyond the odd discussion down the pub about how a game has gone or someone has played.

I'm of the belief that those actually interested in the history of the club, how the club is run, finances, PR etc are in the minority.

[Bluepeter9 5,167]

I'm of the belief that those actually interested in the history of the club, how the club is run, finances, PR etc are in the minority.

.. an astounding statement IMHO.

I can see the poll now.. and your answers

1. Are you interested in the clubs history? NO

2. Do you car if the club is well run ? NO

3. Are you interested in what the club has to say (PR)? NO

However I very much doubt that the 'minority' would reply the same way? I may want to enjoy the moment, I may enjoy debating how we look forward. But I also enjoy looking back (History), knowing what limits the club has to run with in terms of getting new/beter players (How well club is run) and what is the clubs views on football life (PR) . BUT I have been accused of being in the minority before!

[MrSifter 181]

.. an astounding statement IMHO.

I can see the poll now.. and your answers

1. Are you interested in the clubs history? NO

2. Do you car if the club is well run ? NO

3. Are you interested in what the club has to say (PR)? NO

However I very much doubt that the 'minority' would reply the same way? I may want to enjoy the moment, I may enjoy debating how we look forward. But I also enjoy looking back (History), knowing what limits the club has to run with in terms of getting new/beter players (How well club is run) and what is the clubs views on football life (PR) . BUT I have been accused of being in the minority before!

What is astounding is your faith in polls and respondents. If you had any experience and knowledge of them at all you'd know respondents very often answer in a manner in which they think they should, not how they actually behave or intend to behave.

As for those three questions they are moronic, mean diddly squat and three equally ridiculous questions might be:

1. Do you actively research the club's history? NO

2. Do you think the club is best run by experienced indiviuals who are given autonomy to act in the best interests of the club? YES

3. Do you think inexperienced fans should be running the club's PR? NO

As internet forums like this one and FF prove, the fanatics who spend a lot of their time online discussing virtually every facet of the Club are very much in a minority.

[Bluepeter9 5,167]

.. an astounding statement IMHO.

I can see the poll now.. and your answers

1. Are you interested in the clubs history? NO

2. Do you car if the club is well run ? NO

3. Are you interested in what the club has to say (PR)? NO

However I very much doubt that the 'minority' would reply the same way? I may want to enjoy the moment, I may enjoy debating how we look forward. But I also enjoy looking back (History), knowing what limits the club has to run with in terms of getting new/beter players (How well club is run) and what is the clubs views on football life (PR) . BUT I have been accused of being in the minority before!

What is astounding is your faith in polls and respondents. If you had any experience and knowledge of them at all you'd know respondents very often answer in a manner in which they think they should, not how they actually behave or intend to behave.

As for those three questions they are moronic, mean diddly squat and three equally ridiculous questions might be:

1. Do you actively research the club's history? NO

2. Do you think the club is best run by experienced indiviuals who are given autonomy to act in the best interests of the club? YES

3. Do you think inexperienced fans should be running the club's PR? NO

As internet forums like this one and FF prove, the fanatics who spend a lot of their time online discussing virtually every facet of the Club are very much in a minority.

Take a chill pill - relax it Friday have a ......

...... and I note you fanatically post a lot on here ! Interesting!

[MrSifter 181]

Take a chill pill - relax it Friday have a ......

...... and I note you fanatically post a lot on here ! Interesting!

I just assume we're all fanatical about Rangers on here?!?! We all discuss most facets of the club every day on here. Apologies but it wasn't intended as an insult. I'm more disappointed in the fans who are apathetic and have to say they seem in the majority. I'm probably wrong though and the Genital will be along to say so in no time!

[Bluepeter9 5,167]

Take a chill pill - relax it Friday have a ......

...... and I note you fanatically post a lot on here ! Interesting!

I just assume we're all fanatical about Rangers on here?!?! We all discuss most facets of the club every day on here. Apologies but it wasn't intended as an insult. I'm more disappointed in the fans who are apathetic and have to say they seem in the majority. I'm probably wrong though and the Genital will be along to say so in no time!

Ach youll get told your wrong lots of times if you have an opinion on here, about anything!! Doesn't mean you are but that or getting called a tim or variation of seems a common rejoinder!