Nowhere to hide- Daily Mail reporter breaks embargo as he reveals £4m plus Ibrox losses

Gary Keown has become the first mainstream reporter to publicise the £4.144m loss in the 2023 accounts of the Ibrox Tribute Act which were published on Monday.

Without exception from BBC Scotland to the Daily Record and Scotsman they all opted to highlight ‘an operating profit of £252,00’ rather than the main figures in the accounts.

Income for the year reduced from £86.8m in 2022 down to £83.7m with losses up from £919,000 to £4,144,000.

The headline figures are fairly transparent from the accounts but without fail the summaries all led with the ‘operating profit for the second year running’.

Despite reaching the Champions League group stage for the first time ever and selling Calvin Bassey and Joe Aribo income was reduced, it is hard to see the accounts for 2024 recording income above £70m unless there is a long run in the Europa League or an unexpected transfer windfall.

While others speculate over Philippe Clement’s likely transfer targets in January Keown breaks some unwelcome news for bear in his Daily Mail column:

WHEN a Scottish team is still ending up with a £4million-plus net loss from a year in which it competed in the Champions League group stage and sold a player for just short of £20m, it is perfectly evident there is nowhere to hide. For anyone.

Not the board. Not the football department. Not the executive team. Not the youth academy. No one.

In fairness, it didn’t take much reading between the lines of chairman John Bennett’s opening address in the Ibrox club’s Annual Report — still more like the script of ‘Brewster’s Millions’ than the balance sheets of a fully-functioning business — to get the message that we really are at the end of the road now with the misty-eyed reflections on ‘The Journey’ and the talk of rebuilding and regenerating and carrying the burden created by the sins of others since 2012.

Bennett, no matter his faults, has quite some skin in the game here. According to the accounts, he still has over £12m in loans outstanding. Lord knows how much else he has ploughed into the place.

His words certainly read, and felt, like those of a guy running out of patience in search of a greater return than just his pre-agreed four per cent interest.

These annual reports tend to be an exercise in accentuating the positive, but the tone was set early when Bennett stated: ‘Having spent recent months getting closer to the daily operations of the club, it is clear to me that there is widespread scope for improvement.’

Chief executive James Bisgrove and other assembled money persons were informed in no uncertain terms that ‘we look forward to seeing clear, tangible results in the current financial year’.

Beale’s summer spending spree and pay off has already cost the club £13.1m during the current season, the next stage is guessing when the club will announce their first share issue of the season.

Last season with the income from transfers and the Champions League there were share issues on February 8, April 3 and April 18.

Dave King and Douglas Park are no longer offering loans to be converted into shares that are rapidly being diluted.

CLICK HERE for Companies House details of last season’s Share Issues.