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Right folks, its finally been decided by the SPL and the SFA that there will be no further extention to the season in Scotland to benefit Rangers push for the quadruple.

Anyone have an opinion on this do you support an extention or are you against it reasons for reasons against?

I am listening to the phone in on Radio Clyde just now and I'm pissing myself at some of the Rangers fans who feel hard done by, clearly there are some who don't understand basic logistics.

My view for what its worth is, I am against any extention and that include the original decision to extend the league by an extra 4 days meaning we finish the season on Thursday 22nd of May rather than on original end date of Sunday 18th of May. 

Firstly I am against this on the grounds that I want Rangers pushed to the absolute limit to make sure that Celtic can have every opportunity to win the league.  Now that may sound unfair, but at the beginning of the season we all set out knowing the games we had to play, we entered all competitions I assume with the idea of winning everything we entered that includes the League Cup, League, Scottish Cups and European Competitions.  IMO Rangers have brought on this fiasco themselves by failing to aquire a strong enough squad to deal with all these competitions.  Further their fixture backlog has ben caused by their failure to see off 1st division opposition in the Scottish Cup, the SPL already agreed to postponing one of their games to allow them extra time to prepare for a Champions League game against Lyon.

Other reasons for games being called off include the failure to protect the park from flooding during heavy downpours.

Rangers fans seem to think they feel hard done by, but at the end of the day as I have stated above they set out at the start of the season they knew what the scenario was so pushing for the rules to be changed during the season is just a NO GO in my opinion.

FYP ;)

Basically its this imo. Unfair on the rest of the SPL if league extended. Unlucky for Rangers as they expect help from the SFA/SPL in their quest to win the uefa cup. SPL/SFA cant keep everyone happy so do nothing!!!! Now that Rangers and Celtic have both been affected with the same decision in the same situation, hopefully the authorities will have a learnt a lesson and can plan in some way for 31 years time when celtic reach the uefa cup final ;D

I think they have to draw the line somewhere and tho Rangers have had such a great season it would be unfair to extend the season further.

2 wins in 10 games ;) Load of draws though.

 another reason they have had a game cancelled is to play in european competition earlier in the season , to use a cliche , they want to have their cake and eat it.

 when Middlesborough got there they played 8 games in 21 days , are Man Utd and Chelsea asking for extensions to prepare because their both going for the league ??

 and what about teams like Dundee Utd and Queen of the South are they second fiddle to Rangers ???

 Queen of the South have done amazingly to get to the Scottish cup final , biggest day in their history , massive day out for the fans from Dumfrieshire , but let's just put it off to a midweek game to suit Rangers , the SPL have made the right choice .

 Rangers , i can hear your bum squeaking fae here hahaha

Why don't they just ask UEFA to put the final back a couple of weeks?

stop whinging, get on with it, pro athletes should be able to cope with a few games, club was aware of the position at the start of the season, can't believe I agree with Bandit on something.

As ye sow, so shall ye reap...

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/scottish/celtic-should-be-thankful-for-run-says-mcleish-594169.html

Motherwell should be fined and maybe even have had points docked presplit due to them causing much of the fixture pile up. Teams have been refused promotion from the 1st division as their grounds are not up to scratch. Everybody had problems with the weather but nobody had so many games put off.

Yes as a country we should support our clubs to be successful in europe but the clubs have a duty to the fans who may have paid for travel/accomodation to games on the date the season should have ended. Players/staff/fans from all clubs may have booked holidays to coincide with the end of the season. International fixtures have also been arranged shortly after the season ends.

It is hard to have any sympathy for guys when they say "too many games" "tired" when they set out at the start of a match to play an extra 30 minutes.

Sandy

? the pitch had to host Gretna all season, hardly 'Well's fault is it?

Wasnit Motherwells choice to allow Gretna to use there ground with a financial sweetner.  Again cake and eat it.

Surely they could guess to an extent how the pitch would look after twice as many games though?  And the extra cash they've made off Gretna could have been put towards a new pitch halfway through the season?

Docking points is harsh though!

'Well agreed to the groundshare and accepted rent from Gretna so they did have a responsibility to make sure that the pitch was playable.

Back to Rangers, I dont think any side should have to kick off a cup final 40 hours after the end of a league game, but the Cup final should NOT be moved, extend the league if needs to be, but leave the cup finals alone...

Its not 40 hours though Rangers will play on Saturday the 10th of May then again on the 14th thats a full 3 day.

And why give precedent to the UEFA cup over the League? 

It was only a few years ago Rangers had one team for the League and one for Europe whatever happened to that?

The fixtures with the first extention seem fine. Its not like they are crossing time zones for the final.

If they get their league games won they might be in a position to rest players for the final league game and be fresh for the cup final. Or they could use some reserves for it. I've seen a few Thursday night Saturday lunchtime games, and they are 2.5 hours better off than that at worst.

Had the Motherwell pitch not been unplayable for so long then there would have been dates that some spl fixtures would have been played. The knock on effect is that there are more outstanding fixtures now than there otherwise would have been.

It is Motherwells fault they hosted Gretna all season. They were approached and came to an agreement. I'm not sure that is why the pitch was so bad though. It was one section of the ground near the touchline as i recall and not the whole pitch.

Can Rangers really blame tiredness on their faltering league challenge ?  If so they only have 2 points in 4 games and they haven't got to the games they are complaining about yet !!! Had they played better they could have rested players for some games.

Sandy

Just to clarify.

In order to help Rangers, the Glasgow Fair Fortnight has been moved to the September weekend; which in turn has been shifted to January. Christmas Day will fall on March 27th, New Year's Day shall remain the same - but will only last 3 hours. Everybody's birthday has been cancelled and pregnancies will last 13 months.

Hope that clears things up.

looking foward to hearing rangers fans point of view on this.

marvellous

and a Newcastle one just freshly started too

happy days!

where are the Rangers fans'?

one is on an extended holiday.

(http://www.farfromneutral.com/exodus/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/o_rly.jpg)

 /:-|

sadly.

July 5th remains unchanged? 

July 5th is always the same every year

Just how many user ids was he using ? Or is this the "follow follow" guy and the rest are roaming around dazed and confused ?? Or are they away to speak to the kleeneze sales reps to see if they can buy tissues in bulk for the end of season greeting match ??

 ;D

Sandy

Thursday, 22 May 2008
Clydesdale Bank Premier League
Aberdeen v Rangers, 19:45

Saturday, 24 May 2008
Scottish Cup
Queen of South v Rangers, Final, 15:00


Looks like 40 hours to me...

I wouldnt give precident to one over the other, just the logistics of moving the League games would be easier than Cup finals...

Different cups you guys are talking about.

Sandy

Yes, but same applies, move the league games if needs be, not the finals...

my post would be about 3 pages long, dont want to give the celtic fans (especially bandit) the pleasure. ill just seeth instead

"Scotland manager George Burley has criticised the Scottish Premier League fixture list for failing to help Rangers ahead of the Uefa Cup final.

"I think it's ridiculous that I'm naming the squad and Rangers still have seven games to play," he said ahead of Scotland's game with Czech Republic.

"They are being punished for their success in reaching the Uefa Cup final.

"And it's something that the SPL and everyone in Scottish football has got to look at."

The SPL had delayed its final-day fixtures by four days after Rangers reached the Uefa Cup final.

But that still left Rangers facing four games in eight days as they chase the European trophy, the Scottish title and look to add the Scottish Cup to the CIS Insurance Cup they have already lifted this season.

Russia's football federation postponed Zenit St Petersburg's fixtures ahead of the 14 May showpiece in Manchester.

Meanwhile, a meeting between the Scottish Football Association and the SPL rejected Rangers' request for a further postponement - of Saturday's meeting with Dundee United.

"It shouldn't happen to any club and shouldn't happen again in Scottish football," said Burley.

"It has to be looked at in the fullness of time.

"Europe's changing with the Champions League and Uefa Cup. You've got to change with it."


bbc

The big prob re the Uefa cup is that Zenit have played a handful of league games as their domestic season has just started so will be pretty fresh and Rangers are gonna be out on their feet come the final.

News just in

In order to help rangers the fair fortnight has been moved to September weekend, which in turn has been moved to January.  Xmas day will be on march 27th, new years day to remain the same but will only last 3 hours.  Also everyones birthdays have been cancelled and pregnancy's to last 13 months.  Hope this clarifys the situation

Why did George not cancel the friendly against Croatia?  Rangers could have played that week. As it was they had 5 players 'injured' but all fit for the Rangers Celtic game a few days later.

BTW there's been a lot of hyperbole from Ibrox & their allies about "everyone's laughing at us, no other league would do this before a European Cup Final".

BUT Here's Middleborough's fixture list at the end of the 2005/06 season:

English Premier Middlesbro 2-0 West Ham 17-04-2006  Monday
UEFA Cup Steaua 1-0 Middlesbro 20-04-2006  Thursday
English FA Cup Middlesbro 0-1 West Ham 23-04-2006  Sunday
UEFA Cup Middlesbro 4-2 Steaua 27-04-2006  Thursday
English Premier Middlesbro 0-1 Everton 29-04-2006  Saturday
English Premier Man Utd 0-0 Middlesbro 01-05-2006  Monday
English Premier Bolton 1-1 Middlesbro 03-05-2006  Wednesday
English Premier Fulham 1-0 Middlesbro 07-05-2006  Sunday
UEFA Cup Middlesbro 0-4 Seville 10-05-2006  Wednesday

spot on Rod.

was slightly funnier 1 day and 1 page earlier tbh

lol didn't see it obv

Pointless debate. Celtic would want the delay if they were in Rangers situation but they won't admit it.

whether celtic would want it or not is not the point, any team in that position might ask to get the league extended but is it fair to the rest of the league?

agreed, of course Celtic'd want it and there's nothing wrong with Rangers wanting it or asking for it

it's the whingeing afterwards when they've not got it that I don't like

We wanted assistance in 2003 - were refused it by Rangers & the SPL - the only assistance we got was Dundee offering to bring a game forward into a free midweek.

The other problem with extending the league is we have internationals being called up for Euro 08 & friendlies before it. They now have to knock back the friendlies (possibly losing the chance to play at the championships), or miss the final game.

I think the reason Rangers are pissed off with not getting their own way is that Zenit have had games postponed to help them through to the final and do get good treatment from their federation. I can also see all the other teams in Scotland not wanting to extened the season. It would never happen in England either. Yeah games get moved but not the final fixtures and Fa cup final.

I think the Russian league is at an early point in their season so its easier to re-arrange Zenit's games.

I just hope Rangers can come through this and win everything, it would be a shame if they came this far and became a victim of their own success.

Do you want to win the league because you were the best team or because the best team were knackered/injured at the business end of the season?

TBF Rangers won the league in 2002/03 when Celtic got to UEFA final and obviously profitted from the amount of games Celtic had to play. This is a non thread IMO: each club will act in it's own self interest and it just get's muddied with all the usual Rangers/Celtic rubbish (again IMO)

Rangers have to play 1 more game than if they had lost their uefa semi. If 1 extra game causes a professional club to go into meltdown with injuries and tiredness then they have a real problem.

This has happened for years and years and wont change.

I am not bitter that Leeds were made to play wolves 2 days after the FA CUP final :( and lost the game and the league.

If we win the league we will win it on our own merits.  If rangers or any other team want to compete in all 4 competitions its up to them to ensure the have to squad to cope with fixture congestion.  its been said before its a consequence rangers have this fixture pileup not a punishment

Surely if Celtic win the league they will win it because they are the best team over the course of the season? It would have nothing to do with Rangers being knackered?

Rangers have already been given help this season by the SPL in getting their game against the mighty Gretna called off. 

sir Minty Moonbeam is used to the rest of Scotland pandering to his every whim and now he had thrown his toys out the pram.

Celtic asked for assistance in 2003 and it was rejected by both Rangers and the SPL.  They knew the fixtures at the beginning of the season they could have faced.

Take into consideration the games teams in the English Championship play with league comittments, cup games both League and FA and then things like that other trophy used to be LDV vans dunno what it s now.

 rotflmfao rotflmfao :hello:

Aye thats the same as the UEFA cup

And your point is?  These guys are still playing more games at their level, and to be fair that level is probably above much of what Rangers have faced this season.

Lets be honest Rearrangers aren't really looking for help to win the UEFA Cup they are looking for help to win the league. Smith was going on about the 4 games in 7 days but these are all after the UEFA Cup Final, the last one being against Queen of the South!!!

I would have no problem with their game on Saturday against Dundee Utd being postponed as long as Utd agreed to it & the rearranged game was played before the end of the already rescheduled end of season date. The season has already been extended for them so why they thought they would get another one God only knows, they just need to suck it & get on with it.

dont care what the reason for winning it is, the record books will show league champs 2008, not league champs 2008 (but only cos rangers were shagged from playing lots of games poor things)

Daftest question of the year award surely?

Which was my point, this time round it is Celtic fans that don't want game re-arranged because they're bitter they aren't competing for four trophies. It has and would be the same the other way round.
Celtic Rangers rubbish prevents people from seeing and admitting to this.

Bollocks!  Rangers have already have 2 games re-arranged, we don't want any further postponments because we don't want to give them any further advantage in the race for the title it has nothing to do with the fact that Rangers are competing for 4 trophies.  Sure that hurts but hey ho, we can't do anything about that.

Generalisationaments LOL. It WASN'T the same the other way round. The guy in charge of the SPL said we were deluded when we said it would be different for Rangers. The Rangers management told us to get on with it "I'd love to have their problems". Now things have changed. I will agree that the calloffs etc have had some effect. There has been an extension now, any further extension would give Rangers an advantage.

I thought this was original Teacake wit, I was about to light a candle and sing a song in his honour.

Then someone else posts the same thing word for word, leading me to believe that it came from another board.

The candle has been snuffed, the piano lid is closed, it will be a dark and solemn afternoon.

this is a thinly veiled seething thread imo. we re gonna win the lot.

;iagree;

An excellent article penned by Scotlands top Sports journalist Graham Speirs, lifted from another site whish has a filter so Scotlands Shame FC = Rangers, can't be arse changing it all and Scotlands Shame is about right.

From The Times:


Hot air from Sir David Murray but no answer 

We’ve just had one of those special moments that come around every so often in Scottish football, almost akin to a statement from Buckingham Palace or the issuing of a Papal edict. When Sir David Murray, the chairman of Scotland's Shame FC, pipes up, would everyone please stand to attention and listen?

Murray is most upset at the alleged “treatment” of Scotland's Shame FC by the Scottish Premier League. Scotland's Shame FC, in reaching the Uefa Cup final against Zenit St Petersburg next week, are playing eight games in 21 days, and the Scotland's Shame FC chairman has raged at the SPL's refusal to cancel Saturday’s match between his club and Dundee United, which would have given Walter Smith’s men more breathing space before facing Zenit.

What Murray, like just about everyone else in this saga, has proved good at is producing much indignant and spluttering hot air. What he has not been so adept at, and certainly not while issuing his official statement the other day, is in offering a practical answer to a very teething fixtures problem.

Let’s put it this way. If the SPL had cancelled this Saturday’s match at The Reichstag, then when could the game against Dundee United have been rescheduled? Answer... there isn’t a vacant slot for it anywhere between now and the end of the season on Saturday, May 24.

It is not a question of any agenda against Scotland's Shame FC, it is a question of practicality and available dates. In his public wrath, though, this appears to have by-passed Murray’s comprehension. The statement issued by the Scotland's Shame FC chairman seemed peculiar, not to say one which smacked of paranoia in its hint of a vendetta against Scotland's Shame FC by the SPL.

For instance, Murray warned ominously that Scotland's Shame FC had “not been treated fairly” and that he intends to “meet with the SPL at the end of the season to understand their decision-making process on certain matters”. My goodness, Lex Gold and other SPL apparatchiks will be quaking in their boots at this. Quick, lads, fetch the tin helmets!

What do these words of Murray hint at? Surely he does not believe the SPL was actually interested in hindering Scotland's Shame FC’ chances in the Uefa Cup final? If he does, we’re as well calling in the psychiatrists to attend this imminent Murray/SPL summit.

The SPL, in truth, has been interested in one thing and one thing only: fixing an end-of-season fixture schedule that had become nightmarish due to the problems and tragedies which have afflicted this 2007-08 season.

Murray, appearing a trifle off-beam, then cited the Russian football authorities and their treatment of Zenit St Petersburg, as if this had anything to do with it.

Zenit’s matches, unlike those of Scotland's Shame FC, have been cancelled with ease in the build up to Manchester next week, because the Russian season is still in its infancy. Frankly, they have dates galore in which to reschedule Zenit’s games, as would the SPL with Scotland's Shame FC if this drama was occurring in September instead of now.

Don’t people get it? It is a matter of too many games and too few available dates. And, because of the chase for third place in the Clydesdale Bank Premier League, you cannot have Dundee United playing a game out of synch with Hibernian or Aberdeen, with any advantage that that might give them. Where is the “vendetta” or the “agenda against Scotland's Shame FC” in this?

Somewhat fatuously, Murray even claimed that “people will be laughing throughout the world” at the SPL and its treatment of Scotland's Shame FC. To be honest, I’m not sure if Scottish football is that important to have people the world over holding their sides with laughter. Closer to home, though, some are certainly starting to laugh at Scotland's Shame FC over their endless bleating and squealing.

There is one further irony in all of this, which is the position of the SFA. At the head of that organisation is Gordon Smith, a former Scotland's Shame FC player and a Scotland's Shame FC supporter, who you would ordinarily think cannot be counted among this apparently growing list of citizens and organisations who have it in for the club. Late on Tuesday night Smith was invited to join the debate and he, too, failed to see how the Scotland's Shame FC-Dundee United game this Saturday could possibly be cancelled. Smith was asked if the Scottish Cup final on May 24 could be put back, thus creating an extra matchday, but declined this proposal on practical grounds.

Is Smith, the great Ranger, now deemed to be antiRangers? I certainly hope not, as that would be preposterous as much as unfair.

Most of us have argued all along that the SPL owed it to the Scottish game to help Scotland's Shame FC as much as possible. I was among those who were less than enamoured with the revised fixture schedule that was produced on April 22, asking Scotland's Shame FC to play four matches in eight days. It seemed a stressful schedule in a hectic period.

But what cannot be tolerated is this pathetic charge of the SPL deliberately working against the good of Scotland's Shame FC. This kind of nonsense only stirs some of the neanderthals in our midst, and Sir David Murray should know better than to venture down such a road

rotflmfao

They'll be asking to have the start of next season brought forward now as they have Champions League qualifiers to play now.

Another UEFA cup "adventure" beckons I think. Whichever city is hosting the final next year will be moving to Defcon 3 as I type  ;D

A man goes to Glasgow airport and eventually goes into the departure lounge to wait for the call for his flight home. The place is a mess. All around him are overturned tables, smashed windows, upturned chairs, broken flight monitors and crowd control barriers littering the floor. "Christ, what happened here?" he asks one of the ground crew.
"Oh," he replies. "Bloody hopeless it was, we had the Rangers squad in here this morning filming the new Nike ad!"

Sandy

The Gers to replace Simply The Best with a new theme tune...?

YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL15Ya5fsgo

That's unfair, we'll play whenever Celtic tell the SPL they want us to play, just like this season.  ;D