JABBA THE AGNIVORE

A LOAD OF CRAIG WHYTE

Further to Jim Traynor's efforts yesterday to once again put the blame for Rangers' demise squarely at the door of Craig Whyte, it's worth having a look at what he said about Whyte previously:

This is what he had to say in The Daily Record on November 18th 2010

"Walter Smith will be handed a massive January cheque book if Scots billionaire Craig Whyte succeeds in his £30million bid to buy Rangers.

The lifelong Light Blues fan is heading up a consortium that includes Andrew Ellis and emerged last night as the man who could restore the Ibrox club's fortunes on and off the pitch.

Talks are at an advanced stage and if a deal is closed cash-strapped Smith will be able to strengthen the threadbare squad in his bid to capture three titles in a row."

Yep, exciting times ahead for Rangers, according to Jabba.


Here is what he said in The Daily Record on 7th June last year:


"Record Sport understands Whyte remains prepared to cover the cost of new manager Ally McCoist's rebuilding programme.

It is believed the £5million the new chairman said he would invest in the team in his first season is in the bank but there will be more if McCoist wants it.

The first £5million of additional working capital is also ringfenced.

And a further £1.7million has been earmarked to begin upgrading some of the stadium's facilities, including the public address system, which have been neglected over the last five years.

But it has also been made clear these figures are a minimum and that more will be spent if required."


All very positive. I don't know if that was the first use of the word 'ringfenced' but it certainly wasn't the last!

Meanwhile, the 'cyber domains of the deranged' were telling a different story: one where Craig Whyte had been banned from being a director, where he had run off before leaving trails of debt behind him and where his 'off-the-radar' wealth could not be seen on the radar because it didn't exist!

Fast forward to the BBC's documentary and Traynor and Jackson's 'exclusive' about the Ticketus money. After that, the whole house of cards came tumbling down. Traynor likes to give himself a pat on the back for this 'exclusive' but, more than likely, the 'cyber domains of the deranged' had the story before he did. 

So then we have all the programmes on TV doing a post-mortem on the corpse of Rangers: how did it happen? One of these programmes provided me with one of the best laughs ever. Traynor came on to say how untrustworthy Craig Whyte had been etc etc and then produced his punchline: 'I've been saying this all along...!' Yes, that's right Jim, we remember it well.

So his story now is that the whole sorry saga is the fault of Craig Whyte and the only thing that Murray did wrong was to 'sell' the club to Whyte. Apparently the debt had been reduced by this time. Really? So how come no legitimate buyer came forward? Given the running costs of the club it is difficult to see how this reduction in debt could have been achieved. The words smoke and mirrors spring to mind.

It also seems that nothing was 'ringfenced' at Rangers, including the one ring that needed a fence - Murray's, to keep Jabba's tongue out!