Scot to trot? (Rangers and Celtic Football Clubs Leaving Scotland)

Member Name: davidbuttery

Product:	Rangers and Celtic Football Clubs Leaving Scotland
Date:	01/05/02 (331 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Er... someone else winning in Scotland?

Disadvantages: Sectarianism, another victory for greed, goes against the principle of earning places on merit

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. And no. I hope I don't appear to be sitting on the fence here... Rangers and Celtic's entry into the English league might well happen thanks to the unstoppable power of the pound (or euro, depending on how long it takes!), but I hate the idea with a passion.

Firstly, if we're going to have clubs crossing borders to chase the money, then they should at least be honest about it and go the whole hog - by actually starting up the much-vaunted "G14 Atlantic League" or some such. If the Rangers/Celtic move happens as rumoured, we'll have Portuguese clubs trying to join the Spanish League, Austrian clubs the Bundesliga, etc, etc.

This is a bad thing - a very bad thing. You only have to look at the ludicrously-titled "Champions'" League to see why this is. Be honest: how many neutrals give a stuff about the group stages per se (as opposed to watching any individual match)? Not very many. That's because - with rare exceptions - these matches lack either of the two things that can get the blood thumping: history and tradition (OK, that's two on its own), or a sense of "specialness".

If we had an FA Cup-style unseeded knockout in the European Cup, then things would probably be different - every so often the champions of Latvia could shock someone like Bayern Munich, and a match like Real Madrid v Juventus would be a great occasion worthy of the hype. As it is, no-one cares much - you get an impression of "oh well, another 0-0 draw - now we need only 43 points from our last remaining 103 first phase games and we'll go through on goal difference"...

The "history and tradition" argument is the more important. The powers that be have to get one thing hammered into their thick heads: football clubs are *not* blasted supermarkets - if I don't like Tesco's beans I'll go to Sainsbury's down the road, but if Kidderminster Harr
iers get into trouble (for example through losing their manager to, let's say, Hull [good grief]) then I *can't* suddenly up sticks and start supporting Shrewsbury Town instead! Loyalty is everything for football fans, and it's a disgrace that this loyalty is so cynically exploited. (This is one reason I think football clubs should be barred from being PLCs, as I believe is the case in France - why should the Stock Exchange have to know about a club's top scorer being transferred before anyone who actually cares about the club?).

The same argument applies to Celtic and Rangers - they're not, never have been, and never will be, English clubs. They're Scottish ones, and as such have no place in the English league, full stop. The Welsh clubs are here because there was no Welsh league 100 years ago, and they came up through the ranks, so have *earned* the right to stay, rather than being inserted artificially. And Berwick play in the Scottish League and Gretna in an English one for geographical reasons that don't apply to Glasgow.

Another problem is this: if the Scottish clubs were admitted, where would they go? There is an argument for saying that, as far as the English FA was concerned, they should count as newly-formed teams, and apply for membership of a county FA like anyone else. I must admit that Celtic v Bridgnorth Town has a certain appeal... there's a serious point here, though - let's say the Scottish clubs were allowed straight into the Premier League. Why on earth should First Division clubs suffer from Celtic & Rangers replacing promotion spots (and why should smaller Premiership clubs vote for a probable 2-up, 4-down season)? If the Scottish sides went into the First Division, the same would apply to Second Division teams. And so on and so forth down the league - there's no satisfactory solution.

And then there's Europe. As things stand, both Rangers and Celtic are virtually guaranteed
European football every year. That wouldn't be the case if they joined the English setup - there's debate as to how well they'd fare, but given the fact that they can barely even compete with the likes of Charlton and West Ham in the money stakes (OK, so English TV money is bigger, which is of course why this move is being mooted, but that's not everything) I can't see them being above UEFA Cup contenders. The Premiership is much harder than the occasional European game.

Before you argue with that, look at Ipswich - they could beat Inter Milan in Europe, but couldn't sustain a 38-game domestic campaign. And though I'm pretty sure Rangers and Celtic would be promoted from the First Division at the first attempt it might not be quite so easy thereafter as they think. They'd have more competition than in Scotland, but do they really want to become much smaller fish in a shark-infested pond?

Of course, UEFA and FIFA might cause obstacles to the merger. FIFA have said that they see no particular objection to the plan as they understand it, but I rather doubt that UEFA would feel the same way - it likes to throw its weight about. This would be the first step on the road to a UK-wide football team - which might be a good idea eventually, but is hardly uncontroversial.

Lastly, there's the inevitable worry about sectarianism. There's no point kidding ourselves that we don't have violence in English football, of course, and the "No Surrender to the IRA" chanting is dreadful, but sectarianism as such has almost disappeared within domestic football, even in those places where it was rife as recently as the 1950s - I lived in Liverpool a few years ago, and the only major piece of bigotry I can remember was when a proposed twinning of the city with Dublin was howled down (and there were local politics involved there too, which muddied the waters). There's still far too much bigotry in Glasgow. I
don't want Rangers and Celtic allowed anywhere near our league while sectarianism continues - it's not "an essential part of the clubs' history", it's a vicious load of evil racist crap. We might as well let in Le Pen Rovers.

The attendance argument is a false one - the well-supported clubs like Newcastle and Man Utd are already sold out every week, and many of the others have small grounds. If the gate money was still shared as in days of old (and the FA Cup), it might be a worthwhile point, but as things stand it's irrelevant.

The one decent argument I've seen for the move is that it would allow the remaining Scottish clubs to have a chance at the Champions' League. There's a flaw in this, too, though - without the Old Firm the Scottish League would be so weak that UEFA would certainly reduce its representation, and there might not be an automatic Champions League place even for the winners.

Summing up, then: what's in this for football? Answer: not a lot. It would set a dangerous precedent, which might well be the beginning of the end for the supremacy of national leagues. And I'm really not remotely interested in constantly seeing Liverpool play Barcelona rather than Manchester United, Arsenal play Juventus rather than Spurs or Newcastle play Roma rather than Sunderland. Go back to Scotland you two, stop being so damn arrogant with the rest of the SPL, and stop daydreaming.

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