Dave King has revealed his obsessional fear of Celtic winning 10-in-a-row.
The man who sat on the Ibrox board as Dave Murray enjoyed free reign from Gavin Masterton at the Bank of Scotland before turning to tax evasion to stay competitive in Scotland seems unwilling to accept the financial reality of life in 2014.
Potential sugar daddies like Douglas Park and Jim McColl have studied the sums and walked away but from his South African base King wants to see someone apply the economics of the madhouse as his worst nightmare creeps ever closer.
Rather than create a club that lives within it’s means, generates and re-invests profits King sees only one purpose for a club from Ibrox- stopping Celtic from winning 10-IN-A-ROW.
Murray’s obsession with matching Celtic’s 1967 European Cup win under Jock Stein ultimately led to the liquidation of Rangers.
King seems to have failed to have learned any lessons from that disaster with the sole purpose of the current club at Ibrox being to stop the ten.
Speaking to the Daily Mail, King who pleaded guilty to 42 tax offences last year, said: “We have to be in a position to go up to the Premiership and we have to be in the position to launch a challenge to Celtic.
“There is no guarantee we are going to beat Celtic in the first season – infact it’s unlikely.
“It would be a miracle if Rangers were to go on and win the league the first season back, but, similarly, we cannot risk going to Celtic Park and being battered 6-0. We can’t start losing 3-1 to Hibs and Aberdeen and accepting it.
“Saying, “we are in a period of adjustment, it’s not too bad a season,” is not an option. It’s totally unacceptable.”
King who predicted administration for Sevco by Christmas added: “The fans deserve more than the downsizing of Rangers to compete in the Scottish first division.
“They deserve a team which is superior to the competition in the lower leagues because they are paying for that.
“They deserve to see a progression in the quality of the finances and the players on the pitch as they move up the leagues so that we enter the Premiership in a competitive frame of mind.
“My concern is that we are making the club smaller. And that we are creating a gap. That’s not the fault of Graham Wallace because he is the CEO and has to deal with what he has got.
“It’s an issue relating to the board who should be having a rights issue – and that could mean the existing guys putting the money in if they want.
“The club needs a level of funding that allows it to go forward above the level they are competing in and make sure they have a fighting chance in the Premiership.
“I would never have expected us to go into the Premier League and come worse than second. I’m mentally not attuned to the possibility of going up there and coming fourth of fifth.
“As a fan I would find that quite unacceptable and I don’t think Rangers should be run as a club which finds it fine to finish fourth or fifth while saying, “that wasn’t bad for a first season back.” The worst we must do is finish second.”
It seems that the more distressed things become at Ibrox the more desperate the solutions to solve the issue become.
With £10m a year needed to keep the lights on at Ibrox and the state-of-the-art Murray Park training facility any club wishing that level of indulgence will need to generate an annual income in the region of £70-80m to meet King’s wishes.
Top ticket prices, competing in the Champions League, selling players for top dollar and maximising commercial income streams are required to get close to that level of income.
With none of those factors present at Ibrox it looks certain that King will witness the crash and burn of the current club long before the nightmare of seeing Celtic clinch 10-in-a-row.
Planned administration 2
Hope it goes as well as the last one.
Haw haw haw