What Price a Heritage.

[bouncybear 43]

What is it that constitutes the heritage of a football club and what price do you place on it?These are big questions that each and every Bear would do well to consider during the coming festive season, for it would appear that our new CEO may have decided on a price tag.Ethos and Heritage are the twin pillars upon which all great institutions build their history. To develop them they must be nurtured and cared for, it takes time to build them, but they are precious and fragile they can be irreparably damaged by a moments carelessness. They define the real value of an institution and they are beyond mere monetary consideration.

Ethos is intangible, yet it is the very essence of belonging. It is what draws people together in a common cause. It unites and in unity lies strength. In recent years our ethos has come under concerted attack by our enemies. They have been joined in this by morally bankrupt journalists and politicians, blinkered, unbalanced and cast adrift in a sea of subjective ‘political correctness’. These are people with no conscience, so embittered in their hatred of Rangers that they turn a blind eye when footballers, that many will see as role models, align themselves with terrorists and murderers. With enemies such as these we must be particularly careful to defend our culture and ethos.

If ethos is our soul then heritage is the physical embodiment of our club. It is the traditions, the history, the folklore, the trophies and the buildings. They have been earned and developed through the hard work and devotion of our predecessors and handed down from generation to generation over 140 years since we were formed by the Gallant Pioneers. We are the current custodians and it is heartening to note that we have stood firm against those vested interests who on the one hand profess that our history ended with the crimes of Craig Whyte, yet who still seek to re-write our history by contrived accusations based upon charges that have already been dismissed by a First Tier Tax Tribunal.

Since his takeover Charles Green has made great strides to repair much of the damage left by his immediate predecessors and for this I am, like most bears, extremely grateful. Sadly he is now risking his personal heritage to our club by promoting the rebranding of Ibrox, purely for commercial reasons. It is of concern that a commercial justification (if ever one could exist) for this has not been forthcoming. We are told that ‘some’ of the money raised by diminishing our heritage to future generations will be available to spend on the playing squad, yet we are also told that the overall levels of funding available for sporting purposes are to be constrained (quite rightly) to financially prudent levels. The suspicion must be that the vast majority of any monies raised by rebranding Ibrox will leave the club in the form of dividends to select investors. There is no basis to believe that this disregard for our heritage will significantly enhance the teams competitiveness either at home or abroad. In spite of his ‘everything is for sale’ pronouncement he has not indicated that spending on the squad will increase as a proportion of revenues if he succeeds in growing these. The prospect is that individuals get richer whilst the team treads water.

I have heard some bears express concern that if we allow Charles Green to sell naming rights that we will lose out to our enemies as they will immediately negotiate a better deal by leveraging their status in Europe and, temporarily, in a higher league. This is not a fear I share. What I fear is that they would consider the sums of money involved to be relatively trivial and deliberately choose to do nothing,

Think about that.

Mr Struth knew the importance of ethos, heritage and tradition. It resonates in one of his most famous quotes.

“To be a Ranger is to sense the sacred trust of upholding all that such a name means in this shrine of football. They must be true in their conception of what the Ibrox tradition seeks from them. No true Ranger has ever failed in the tradition set him.”

We must strive to ensure Charles Green FULLY understands the significance of those words and that he does not allow us to become the generation that fails.

[Tyre Bear 0]

Good post. As you said like many bears i am eternally grateful for what CG has done for our Club, but I am totally against this re-naming of our stadium. Maybe if it was a hefty sum we were getting but I am sure Ashley's deal at Newcastle was for £1.5 million a year? Fuck that.

[Bertent 2,081]

Fear of change is fear of life.

[Fastrax 274]

Fear of change is fear of life.

Eh?

We are debt free, and have 50k~ every 2 weeks, do we really need the money??

[simplythebest 11,453]

Eh?

We are debt free, and have 50k~ every 2 weeks, do we really need the money??

Just because we're in a decent position this second doesn't mean we should stand still.

[legalbeagle 3,734]

Until some sort of proposal exists, it is difficult to truly judge it, if we think that £1.5m a year would pay about 20% of our playing salaries for the year, or buy us some players, then it does seem like an easy enough decision to me, but I understand why others are resistant.

Would it help if it was (using Adidas as a hypothetical sponsor) the : Adidas Ibrox Stadium, or Ibrox Stadium sponsored by Adidas?

[Guest Andypendek]

Are we now the quintessentially hostile to business club?

[simplythebest 11,453]

What is it that constitutes the heritage of a football club and what price do you place on it?These are big questions that each and every Bear would do well to consider during the coming festive season, for it would appear that our new CEO may have decided on a price tag.Ethos and Heritage are the twin pillars upon which all great institutions build their history. To develop them they must be nurtured and cared for, it takes time to build them, but they are precious and fragile they can be irreparably damaged by a moments carelessness. They define the real value of an institution and they are beyond mere monetary consideration.

Ethos is intangible, yet it is the very essence of belonging. It is what draws people together in a common cause. It unites and in unity lies strength. In recent years our ethos has come under concerted attack by our enemies. They have been joined in this by morally bankrupt journalists and politicians, blinkered, unbalanced and cast adrift in a sea of subjective ‘political correctness’. These are people with no conscience, so embittered in their hatred of Rangers that they turn a blind eye when footballers, that many will see as role models, align themselves with terrorists and murderers. With enemies such as these we must be particularly careful to defend our culture and ethos.

If ethos is our soul then heritage is the physical embodiment of our club. It is the traditions, the history, the folklore, the trophies and the buildings. They have been earned and developed through the hard work and devotion of our predecessors and handed down from generation to generation over 140 years since we were formed by the Gallant Pioneers. We are the current custodians and it is heartening to note that we have stood firm against those vested interests who on the one hand profess that our history ended with the crimes of Craig Whyte, yet who still seek to re-write our history by contrived accusations based upon charges that have already been dismissed by a First Tier Tax Tribunal.

Since his takeover Charles Green has made great strides to repair much of the damage left by his immediate predecessors and for this I am, like most bears, extremely grateful. Sadly he is now risking his personal heritage to our club by promoting the rebranding of Ibrox, purely for commercial reasons. It is of concern that a commercial justification (if ever one could exist) for this has not been forthcoming. We are told that ‘some’ of the money raised by diminishing our heritage to future generations will be available to spend on the playing squad, yet we are also told that the overall levels of funding available for sporting purposes are to be constrained (quite rightly) to financially prudent levels. The suspicion must be that the vast majority of any monies raised by rebranding Ibrox will leave the club in the form of dividends to select investors. There is no basis to believe that this disregard for our heritage will significantly enhance the teams competitiveness either at home or abroad. In spite of his ‘everything is for sale’ pronouncement he has not indicated that spending on the squad will increase as a proportion of revenues if he succeeds in growing these. The prospect is that individuals get richer whilst the team treads water.

I have heard some bears express concern that if we allow Charles Green to sell naming rights that we will lose out to our enemies as they will immediately negotiate a better deal by leveraging their status in Europe and, temporarily, in a higher league. This is not a fear I share. What I fear is that they would consider the sums of money involved to be relatively trivial and deliberately choose to do nothing,

Think about that.

Mr Struth knew the importance of ethos, heritage and tradition. It resonates in one of his most famous quotes.

“To be a Ranger is to sense the sacred trust of upholding all that such a name means in this shrine of football. They must be true in their conception of what the Ibrox tradition seeks from them. No true Ranger has ever failed in the tradition set him.”

We must strive to ensure Charles Green FULLY understands the significance of those words and that he does not allow us to become the generation that fails.

What about fans that don't see it as the soul or heritage?

To me it's a glorified sponsorship deal, in an ideal world I'd not have it but I don't see it as selling any kind of soul.

[will_1974 204]

http://en.wikipedia....#United_Kingdom

Examples of renamed stadia and venues

[AlBear. 8,499]

Wonder if anyone else realises you posted this twice after no one commented on the first one?

Congrats bouncy

[TravelingWilBEARy 4,319]

I understand the 'money for old rope' argument but I am deeply uncomfortable with the Ibrox renaming idea, it seems fundamentally wrong for a club like Rangers and a stadium like Ibrox.

[Bluepeter9 5,167]

... but life moves on,challenges change - while looking backwards give a sense of belonging our actions now decide the future. Commercial considerations have to be given full consideration - in a Poll on here the majority who voted about a name change for £10M-£15M would accept it, so who decides that renaming Ibrox is wrong? the minority ? Also what if it was renamed with Ibrox still in the title ?

[Briton 394]

Not worth the relative peanuts we'd get for doing it. Be surprised if it doesn't happen though.

[Redwhiteandblue 3,330]

http://en.wikipedia....#United_Kingdom

Examples of renamed stadia and venues

The bargin booze stadium :-(

good one for the tims in there - the Jakemans stadium.

Also a good point to be made in there, without looking, does anyone know the name of Liverpool's stadium?

[minstral 5,375]

I understand the 'money for old rope' argument but I am deeply uncomfortable with the Ibrox renaming idea, it seems fundamentally wrong for a club like Rangers and a stadium like Ibrox.

Agree with you.

[Drunk and disorderly. 15,094]

There is no sentiment in business. Simples!!!!!

[Bertent 2,081]

Eh?

We are debt free, and have 50k~ every 2 weeks, do we really need the money??

ive just been paid and had a wee bonus, guess i dont have to work again.

[Guardian 4,281]

This naming rights issue has nothing to do with heritage.

You could equally apply the same arguments to puttng sponsors names on shirts, round the pitch, in the programmes or tournaments. (And some probably did)

Ibrox won't be renamed. It was Ibrox, it is Ibrox now and will forever be Ibrox.

If somebody is daft enough to give us a decent chunk of money to hang a sign on the stadium, then we'd be nuts not to let them. Despite recent events, Rangers still need all the revenue we can get and it'd be daft to turn it down if it was a good amount.

As for what the bad people might do, who gives a monkeys chuff ?

[LiverpoolBlue 1,414]

The bargin booze stadium :-(

good one for the tims in there - the Jakemans stadium.

Also a good point to be made in there, without looking, does anyone know the name of Liverpool's stadium?

Still Anfield !