Relegation a reality?

[Scarlet Pimple]

Wait a minute here. There is something very unfair about this.

It has also been and still is about the good little'un making good  -- or the minnow in a large pool of bigger fish trying hard to get a leg up in life.That was where the fun and the uplifting of the spirit happened. Now what on earth is wrong with that?

As has been said before, Caley and Thistle were small clubs at one time and a joust with a "big" club from the former first Division in Scotland was in former times a "romantic adventure" and , at worst, a glorious chance to make a name for themselves and a pile of money.And when they failed to win the Scottish Cup in the past did anyone say '''oh, jeez, why did we ever  let such poor teams into this classy arena"?

It is far too simplistic now to trot out the convenient platitudes about Gretna never having been a serious contender for SPL longevity and currently a non-contributor and a basic pain in the bottom to have in the SPL? Oh Really? Well, there but for the grace of God go I it may be said of quite a few other current SPL clubs. There is surely more than an element of hypocrisy here where the occurrence of misadventure  becomes a major crime and where the unfortunate upon whom this has fallen automatically becomes the butt of scathing denunciation and opprobrium.  Hindsight is  very nice to have is it not?

And even if Mileson bankrolled the club to success so what? Are they the only club that has ever arisen from obscurity to be successful because of the backing of powerful individuals who, themselves, had a dream?

Are we all now so cynical about the necessity to have money or the lure of money to have lost all genuine admiration for any person who dares to use the resources at his or her disposal to further the ambitions attendant upon a dream? What if Gretna had actually not ended up bottom of the SPL like ICT may have done at any time in the last few years? Would they have attracted praise instead just because the vagaries of life and the twists and turns of the game allowed them to be one single place above another team--a "break" perhaps which might have lead them on to greatness in the future?

You make up your own mind but I think it is a sadder tale than just a reason to crow or sneer?

[PullMyFinger]

Both Caley and Thistle were much bigger clubs than Gretna ever managed to be. End off.

[maimie]

I've had quite strong views from the start about Gretna which I've largely kept to myself until now. I well remember the 93-94 election for the SFL in which CT and Ross County were successful by a long way. Gretna polled a miserable 2 votes which must be at least a strong pointer towards their lack of substance as a club pre Mileson.

Brooks Mileson poured money into what was in effect a football entity of no substance, with little support, in a tiny community and with no fundamental infrastructure. He cannot be compared with eg Eddie Thomson, David Murray etc becaue they have bankrolled clubs which have fundamental viability  and are substantial entities etc - all of which Gretna has never been.

It was also clear that Gretna was the plaything of a highly unorthodox man - a maverick with a personal mission, possibly a personal agenda having been knocked back previously by Carlisle? I believe.

Brooks Mileson said it all as far as I was concerned when an interviewer put it to him that they would need a major stadium in Gretna. He said he would quite simply build one and when challenged about how full it would be he said he didn't care in the least. The SPL wanted a stadium so they would get one. (Which of course they didn't anyway.) He made it quite clear that he was going to keep pouring money in until they reached the SPL with no heed at all to prudence.

It's a bit difficult to criticise someone who is very ill, but you have to take a very critical look at the apparently attention seeking mindset of someone who transforms his dreadful lifestyle into a public virtue and writes columns for the Sun, boasting about how he smokes 100 cigarettes a day and lives on Lucozade.

Gretna came to a Faustian arrangement with Brooks but it seems they got nothing like 24 extra years of life. Now it seems they are going to the Devil.

It was painfully obvious from the very start that a club like Gretna, lacking all the fundamentals that it did, would only have a limited lifespan which would terminate rapidly at the first significant difficulty on the part of a benefactor who simply bought their way for them up the leagues. I could never understand why there was so much awe at Gretna's "rise". With the kind of money that was thrown at them, it would have been stange if this had not happened.

This was clearly a house of cards right from the start and it has now suffered what was always its inevitable fate. I just don't understand how so many people were conned for so long.

Spot on Charles.  I remember being at a meeting a few years ago with Supporters Direct (the umbrella organisation of the Trust movement) and Brookes was there.  He quite clearly had a huge boulder on his shoulder about the 'suits' running football and it seemed to me at that time that all he was out to do was to poke them in the eye with a very sharp stick.  He was very clear in his aim of reaching the spl as quickly as possible and didn't really care how.  He did come across as a 'fan' though but whether or not this was lulling the gretna faithful into a false sense of security i don't know.  He seemed supportive of the Trust movement, gave money to a few trusts in scotland and england (but not ours i might add) and suggested to the gretna fans they start up a trust at raydale.  this was met with much apathy among the fans as they seemed to see brookes as some sort of lord protector who would safeguard the future of their club regardless....

[Charles Bannerman]

I think there should be some sort of procedure in place to stop this happening again.  I mean it's made scottish football a laughing stock when they are getting bigger crowds at 2nd and some times third division matches than Gretna's SPL matches.

I agree completely. As far as crowds are concerned, Gretna v Dundee United attracted 501 last Thursday although competition from the televised Rangers game was cited in mitigation. However two nights previously,l Ross County had a crowd of 1511 in the Second Division against competition from Barcelona v Celtic.

On now to Scarlet's last post. My remarks are certainly not in hindsight - it has been my view right from the start that the Gretna tale would end in tears and for just the reasons that it has.

Gretna FC, since Brooks Mileson took it over has, in effect, been a mirage. It never had any of the essentials on which other  clubs which are bankrolled to a greater or lesser extent depend in addition to their funds from a benefactor. If the cash is there, which with Mileson it was for a time, it really is not very difficult to throw enough of it at a club to buy in players who are far better than the division you're in and move up the leagues. This is what happened with Gretna but it was inevitable that the bandwagon would be derailed sooner or later for at least three reasons.

1) Unlike most other clubs, Gretna's fundamental profile as a club is not much more than what we see in the Highland League. It is a cash inflated minnow.

2) Sooner or later the money was going to run out, either gradually or, as happened in this case, suddenly and catastrophically, leaving the Emperor exposed as having no clothes at all.

3) Eventually they were going to reach a level of competition which cannot be bankrolled in the way their passage through the lower leagues was. That was the SPL.

I also very much agree with what Maimie has said about Brooks' apparent resentment of the "suits" who run football. That is possibly why he sat with the fans, wore jeans and an old shirt and craved a high profile for his unhealthy lifestyle whilst, by his way of things "bucking the system" by what he thought was beating them at their own game. It failed spectacularly, as it was always doomed to do.

Caley Thistle cannot in any way be compared with Gretna. From Highland League origins, ICT developed steadily in Division 3 and financially just got away with the construction of a necessary stadium in 1996. After that, expansion was steady but even at that they very nearly over reached themselves in 99-00 and were saved by the formation of the ICT Trust. Since then it has been a case of steady and careful expansion in all respects such as crowd base, turnover, commercial income, facilities etc whilst exercising prudent increases with player wages. That is an important point, by the way. ICT have done an excellent job in balancing affordable wages with progress up the leagues. All of this has been helped by the involvement of some very good managers, directors and chairmen. Yes, there has been a major benefactor in the form of David Sutherland and Tullochs but their assistance has been in proportion to and in balance with the fundamental substance of the club and to whatever the level of activity has been at any time.

Crucially with Gretna, that has not been the case. Here, megabucks were thrown at a structure which was totally inadequate to accommodate that and in particular to sustain what had been going on.

It is the glaringly obvious lack of sustainability from the start of everything Gretna have done that seems to have evaded a lot of people. Mileson, as Scarlet says, did indeed try to make a name for himself with a big pile of money but what he did was obviously unsustainable, was clearly going to end in tears and has done no good at all for football in Scotland.

[Charles Bannerman]

the fans (as they) seemed to see brookes as some sort of lord protector who would safeguard the future of their club regardless....

On a separate issue, can I risk ruffling feathers down Grant Street way by suggesting that one of the problems with Clach for years has been that the Merkinch community seem to have expected a football club to be provided for them for sentimental reasons and appear to see no reason to do anything active themselfes to sustain it?

With any luck their embyonic Supporters' Trust will start to shift such a mindset.

[Guest Spectre]

Well it will be interesting to eventually get the real story of something that has clearly been brewing since January last year.

Importantly for Caley, has the SPL come out and said definitively what happens if, as appears to be the case, Gretna will not be able to complete the season?  It would be horrible to be thrown into a relegation scrap with Killie and St Mirren if in fact a club has to be relegated even if another has gone out of business.

[Kingsmills]

The truth, which ought to have been self evident, is now exposed for all to see by the initial comments of the administrators.

Administration is a process of protecting ailing companies from their creditors, for a limited period at least, with a view to finding a willing buyer and nursing the company back to health. Creditors have to come on board but usually they have little option faced with the prosect of accepting a proportion of their debt being repaid by the ultimate owners or often nothing at all if the company is wound up especially after the expenses of administration are taken into account.

In Gretna's case however, there is no sustainable corporate body to nurse back to health, there never was.

Even if the club own Raydale outright the Inland Revenue, who are a preferred creditor, are due a very large six figure sum, will be first in line for any sale procedes.

As I've said before I can't for the life of me see how this particular club can survive adminisration and come out the other side. They will do very well to limp on until the end of the season and even then will have to shed virtually all of their first team squad to do so.

[Charles Bannerman]

They will do very well to limp on until the end of the season and even then will have to shed virtually all of their first team squad to do so.

Which then invites the possible scenario of the SPL title, Europan qualification or top six places possibly being decided on goal difference, which in turn could be determined by who puts how many past Gretna at varoius statges of their decline.

[Kingsmills]

With regard to Spectre's most recent post, I think it's safe to assume that no other team will be relegated in Gretna's place.

[starchief]

Much as I agree that Gretna should never have been promoted in the first place, I can't help but feel it was an amazing experience for the town and their supporters.  They went from a village team to the Cup Final and the SPL.  Now, they will, in all likelihood, go back to where they came from.  Perhaps with all the debt, they might not be THAT Gretna but I'm sure the town will still have a team somehow.

Of course, you have to feel for those left in debt but I'm sure the supporters would do it all again.  Rather that than the lifestyle of East Stirling etc - low crowds, destined to get nowhere.  As that was the best existence Gretna could have hoped for.

[caley100]

Both Caley and Thistle were much bigger clubs than Gretna ever managed to be. End off.

Aye... but we never managed to get to the Scottish cup final....yet

[FortressICT]

I'm watching Sky Sports News just now....and the presenter said that they have till around midday today to get 30k otherwise then they are completely done in!! Just to add even more insult to the on going saga, they were saying that someone broke into the dressing room area and stole 20pairs of boots and other stuff for games...so they are pennyless, playerless and now shoeless :021: :021:

So it looks like they won't last till the end of the season because no-one had actually realised how bad it was!!  

We could well be in a relegation battle!

[Kingsmills]

How often  must it be said, if Gretna fold no other team will be relegated in their place.

[FortressICT]

Has the SPL actually come out and confirmed that??

[Johnboy]

I'm watching Sky Sports News just now....and the presenter said that they have till around midday today to get 30k otherwise then they are completely done in!!

Guess we'll know their fate in about 10 minutes.... Seems a shame it has to end like this - especially as Mileson is said still to have a personal fortune estimated to be between ?50m and ?100m.

He is now, according to various press reports not prepared to back them any further on account of his health...

Ah ... the joys of forming a limited company....

[FortressICT]

There is breaking news on sky sports just now, that there is potential investors at gretna just now looking at the financial situation and possibly looking to invest!  But the have to have the 30k to the adminstraters by 1.30 this afternoon.

And gretna have made an appeal for anyone willing to buy them lunch because their lunch got stolen aswell in the break in last night and they can't afford to buy lunch!  So anyone out there wanting to buy gretna lunch?!? haha!! what ashame! :blah01:

[starchief]

If he really does have the money (and some reports say thee nay) then I'm really surprised he's just pulled out like this.  He could have backed them til the end of the season, then pulled out with the "I've taken them as far as I can" line.  I doubt he ever made money from it, rather it must all have been down to a boyhood dream and desire for glory.  Why become the villain of the piece at this late stage?  :024:

[Kingsmills]

There are strong suggestions that the Mileson family fortune is not what it was.

[Alex MacLeod]

If Gretna fold NO other team will be relegated. If they were then two places would be available to Div 1 which would have a serious knock on effect on the promotions and playoffs in Div 2 & 3.

[Yngwie]

If as reported Gretna had some of their kit nicked, it would almost certainly have been from somebody who is owed money by them, probably an employee.

"I'm not going to get paid what I'm owed so I'll take whatever I can instead" is what happens in every company insolvency, and I've seen cases where the police know who did it but take no action because they consider it to be fair.

[Guest Spectre]

News Conference at 2:15 according to BBC...

[Kingsmills]

That should be interesting.

[RiG]

There is a thread on the Non ICT forum discussing this very topic incidentally.

Much as I agree that Gretna should never have been promoted in the first place, I can't help but feel it was an amazing experience for the town and their supporters.

What about the fans who supported the team "Pre Mileson" and now face the prospect of their team sinking into oblivion because of one mans desire to play real life Football Manager? They will be left with nothing.

[Kingsmills]

I feel sorry for their traditional fan base even if it is very small in number. I feel sorrier still for the employees who are likely to be out of work very soon without any sort of redundancy package.

Whilst the players are more than likely to find employment elsewhere albeit on reduced salaries, there will be very many other empoyees who might be struggling to pay their rent or mortgages or even put food on their table. A very sad end to the tale indeed.

[Kingsmills]

PS. I know that this thread, which originally started as a discussion on whether ICT might be sucked into a relegation battle has gone off topic but I would be inclined to let it continue to run on the main board as the issue is of such high profile and of interest to everybody with an interest in scottish football.