Old Rangers fined over payments

Feb 28 2013

The former Rangers Football Club has been fined £250,000 for making undisclosed payments to players, but will not be stripped of any titles.

An independent commission appointed by the Scottish Premier League (SPL) imposed the penalty, finding "Oldco" bosses guilty of failing to make proper disclosure of "side-letter arrangements" between 2000 and 2011.

The club avoided the most severe sanction of losing up to five SPL titles won during the period investigated after the commission ruled that Rangers "did not gain any unfair competitive advantage". The three-man commission chaired by Lord Nimmo Smith was unanimous in its decision.

The panel found that Rangers, under Sir David Murray's stewardship, entered side-letter arrangements with a large number of players. The club made payments to an offshore employee benefit trust (EBT) and paid players in the form of "loans".

It found that those arrangements, required to be disclosed under the rules of the SPL and the Scottish Football Association, were not disclosed to the football authorities.

The commission statement read: "Although the payments in this case were not themselves irregular and were not in breach of SPL or SFA rules, the scale and extent of the proven contraventions of the disclosure rules require a substantial penalty to be imposed.

"Rangers FC did not gain any unfair competitive advantage from the contraventions of the SPL rules in failing to make proper disclosure of the side-letter arrangements, nor did the non-disclosure have the effect that any of the registered players were ineligible to play, and for this and other reasons no sporting sanction or penalty should be imposed upon Rangers FC." The commission confirmed its earlier decision that Rangers's current owners cannot be held responsible for any breach of rules by the "Oldco".

Chief executive of the new club, Charles Green, said in a statement: "It is abundantly clear from the ruling there was no attempt by Rangers Football Club to secure any unfair advantage or to cheat, as so many people asserted without giving any regard to the actual evidence.

"It is a matter of fact that people within the SPL wanted me, at first, to surrender titles as part of a deal to enable Rangers to play again as a member of the SFA. I rejected and resisted that suggestion and this decision vindicates the position of the board and the supporters."

Rangers boss Ally McCoist said: "As a former player, I know how hard it is to achieve success on the pitch and the suggestion that somehow Rangers sought to gain unfair advantage was deeply insulting to me and others who had worn the Rangers' jersey with immense pride. Our fans will take great heart from this and hopefully now, after all that we have been through, there will be a widespread realisation that it is time to move on."