The SPFL will hold crisis talks at Hampden today over the prospect of cinch walking away from an £8m, five year sponsorship deal.
Imposing the rules equally on all member clubs would deliver a simple solution but as we have discovered since the arrival of the Five Way Agreement in 2012 a different set of rules apply to clubs from Ibrox.
The cinch deal requires member clubs to have the car sales firm logo on their shirt sleeve and on backing boards used for media interviews.
Clubs across the game were quick to comply with the cinch logo obvious at the first match of the season with the exception of Steven Gerrard’s side in their match at home to Livingston.
The Ibrox club now lists 29 official partners/sponsors on their website which includes 32 Red (main partner), Castore (official kit and retail partner), Tomket Tires (official sleeve partner) and The Energy Check (official back of shirt partner).
Parks of Hamilton, owned by ageing Ibrox chairman Douglas, doesn’t appear on that list but the 9-year-old club are claiming a conflict of interest in a commercial contract is preventing them from displaying the cinch logo around Ibrox.
The Daily Record reports:
League bosses will hold emergency talks on Thursday over an escalating crisis with Rangers – after the Ibrox club launched another blistering attack on Hampden’s sixth floor.
Record Sport revealed on Tuesday that SPFL sponsors cinch could pull the plug on a new £8m commercial deal after the champions refused to display any of their branding during an opening day win over Livingston.
And Rangers managing director Stewart Robertson has doubled down on his position in a letter to Scotland’s other 41 clubs in which he raises a series of concerns about the handling of the potentially explosive controversy.
In his letter Robertson insists that Rangers made it clear they would not be able to honour the terms and conditions of the deal before league chief executive Neil Doncaster put pen to paper on the agreement.
He suggests that Doncaster may have been part of an attempted cover-up ever since the dispute with the online car dealers went public.
And he has accused Doncaster of wasting hundreds of thousands of pounds by hiring an external agency to land the lucrative package in the first place.
Now we understand his outburst will be discussed at an urgent SPFL board meeting on Thursday – while league chiefs are still waiting for Robertson to provide contractual proof to back up his claims that Rangers are legally obliged not to promote the partnership with cinch.
A points deduction for failing to comply with the sponsorship would be applied to any club outside of Ibrox.
With Peter Lawwell no longer around in the background SPFL CEO Neil Doncaster is much more vulnerable. Last month Ibrox chief Stewart Robertson was voted onto the board of the SPFL.
CLICK HERE for the 29 firms listed as official sponsors of the club from Ibrox.