Hugh Keevins is finally starting to question the 49Gers and the shambles unfolding at Ibrox.
Perhaps if he hadn’t been hanging onto the words of Keith Jackson he’d be able to understand things a bit easier.
Back in November 2010 Jackson and James Traynor, Record colleagues of Keevins were introducing billionaire Craig Whyte to Record readers.
The San Francisco 49ers don’t own the club at Ibrox. They don’t.
49ers Enterprises don’t even own the club. Not a single share.
Instead crusty old Uncle Andy Cavenagh owns 20% of the shares, is the Chairman and makes the big decisions.
Such as employing three managers in 13 months with a fourth probably just a few weeks away.
Like signing 27 players over three transfer windows while promising the Gullible & Deluded another three to five signings. More of the same please Andy lad.
Just under three weeks ago Keevins tipped McInnes to win the SPFL Premiership title.
His dislike of Celtic hasn’t wavered in more than a decade.
KEEVINS CAN’T COPE WITH CELTIC DOMINATION
In 2016 he tipped Mark Warburton to crush Brendan Rodgers. It is the hope that kills them.
Loyally Keevins has tipped every subsequent Ibrox messiah to win the SPFL title.
Showing signs of waking up from the coma he entered in June 2012 Keevins tells Daily Record readers:
Last Monday, for the first time since Andrew and 49ers Enterprises, got here in the guise of the US cavalry with the plan to Make Rangers Great Again, I thought to myself: “What are these guys going on about?”
The occasion was the gathering of the Ibrox shareholders and Cavenagh was addressing the topic of Youssef Chermiti.
Last Sunday, Youssef suffered a long-term injury that put the governance of the club under intense scrutiny.
What would have been so hard about playing Hibs at home and leaving out Chermiti, for whom Rangers had reportedly rejected a £20m plus offer from Galatasaray?
‘These guys’ are sports speculators. Cavenagh doesn’t have the first idea about soccer as is evidenced by his choices of manager. He can’t even play a flute.
Make Rangers Great Again. Kinda difficult when they died in 2012. Greet is almost all that the Tribute Act has done since being formed by Charles Green.
THE CHERMITI FANTASY- DEJA VU
There was no £20m plus offer from Galatasaray. Just some old fashioned feel-good spin. The sort of stuff served up to sooth angry bears by Keevins’ colleagues down the decades.
And with that Keevins start to ask the questions that most folk thought of when Keith Jackson introduced the San Francisco 49GERS in February 2025.
Next up we have
Cavenagh, or ‘Cav’ as vice-chairman Paraag Marathe called him in front of the assembled throng, said: “Selling a player for a bunch of money if you can’t put it back into the squad and replace him or make the squad better is useless. What we care about is winning, not the financial side of it.”
Begging the chairman’s pardon, but 49ers Enterprises were supposed to bring order where there was chaos and financial stability in the Blue Room where there had been the economics of the madhouse.
49ers Enterprises are nowhere near the Blue Room, the Marble Staircase or the Loving Cup.
At Ibrox they are lumbered with plain old Cav. During the week the Daily Record reported on a possible investment in Linfield. At least he is learning how to play to the gallery.
McInnes said the club were “playing with fire” in terms of stabilising a squad made operationally difficult by injury.
But, on the subject of pyrotechnics, Rangers, under 49ers Enterprises, have burned their way through a lot of money without winning any trophies.
Their recruitment strategy has started to resemble throwing paint at a wall and hoping it settles nicely.
Replace paint and you might be getting close to reality.
Team selection, substitutions and in-game management have all been criticised by fans who are losing faith in the manager at an alarmingly early stage in his tenure at Ibrox.
And 49ers Enterprises must now come into the causes for concern as well. Copious sums have been spent unwisely and, after a series of managers coming and going, the judgement exercised by the custodians of the club’s future now has to be called into question into the bargain.
KEEVINS AT A LOSS OVER THE BLACK HOLE OF IBROX FINANCES
Cav is in this to make a profit. He has roped in some other investors. Folk that don’t want to be named, one year on no-one in the Scottish media would dare look into that awkward situation. Who wouldn’t want associated with the club founded by Mr Green from Yorkshire?
Cav sounds like Tav.
Around £80m was blown buying the club and funding last season’s losses. In April a £16m rights issue kept the lights on.
Tav is finding out the reality that had Douglas Park and Dave King doing handstands as they got rid of their shares. No more cash for equity deals to fund another failed revolution.
At the start of May Danny Rohl was five cup finals away from the group stage in the Champions League.
Derek McInnes has to get past Jablonec over the next two midweeks to secure a place in the Conference League. Loose change when you lose £1m a month when playing in the Europa League.
If McInnes fails it’ll be the bleakest and darkest of winters at Ibrox since Ally McCoist got his managerial career off and running with defeats to Malmo and Maribor.
Things haven’t quite been the same since.
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