Rangers held negotiations to rename ground ‘the cinch Ibrox stadium’ before dispute over SPFL sponsors (The Sun)

I haven't read the entire thread but my information is that cinch did indeed offer us a deal prior to their deal with the SPFL and that deal was worth a lot more than the SPFL one.

It is a big step from there to suggest that Rangers were negotiating with cinch. An offer may have been made and declined for the same reasons we refuse to be a part of the SPFL deal. The key point is that Rangers did not make a deal with cinch.
 
Are you happy with the squad - do you think we should have strengthened the midfield in the Summer?
And what does that have to do with selling what is sacred to us and to the club?

The board have many ways to fund the buying of players and don't need a pishy company to be the name of the stadium for it to happen.
 
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I haven't read the entire thread but my information is that cinch did indeed offer us a deal prior to their deal with the SPFL and that deal was worth a lot more than the SPFL one.

It is a big step from there to suggest that Rangers were negotiating with cinch. An offer may have been made and declined for the same reasons we refuse to be a part of the SPFL deal. The key point is that Rangers did not make a deal with cinch.
Which brings something else into question. With cinch tarting themselves about why the hell are the SPFL paying a 10% finders fee to anyone?
 
Some of the posters in here tying themselves in knots desperately trying to slant this negatively when it means SFA (pardon the pun) given the information we actually know. Which is actually nothing other than desperate SPFL lawyers' innuendo.

Oh yes, it's one of those threads. Hilarious and informative. Not about the subject, but rather the individuals commenting on it and their completely irrational opinions formed.

[closes updated potential yahoo FF log, otherwise known as the 'good guy/wank file'] :p

Thanks for the info and the insight into your petty little minds guys. Appreciate it as always.
  • 'Stadium naming rights is the same as in-stadium, on-shirt sponsorship etc.' :))
  • 'Exclusivity with Parks in one contract means they control every other deal we can enter into' :))
  • 'Just because fulfilling the SPFL cinch deal infringes Parks contract with us, so must be any other potential deal with cinch' :))
  • 'The club could not ask Parks to renegotiate any incompatible parts of existing contracts, had any offer been received when it was in its best interests to do so' :))
  • 'Discussing a contract is the same as actually signing one' :)):)):))
  • 'It's not possible that we were talking to cinch about naming rights as an alternative to having their branding in the stadium etc or some other way to negotiate a settlement to our issues in regards the SPFL contract on offer' :))
  • 'It's not possible that cinch approached us, and we just spoke to them out of courtesy' :))
  • 'It's not possible that cinch deliberately opened negotiations after hearing of our protests to try and put us in this very position' :))
  • 'It's not possible that we refused this deal for the same reasons that we refused the SPFL one and therefore strengthening our case rather than weakening it' :)):)):))
  • 'If we were talking to cinch at all it means we must be hypocrites' :))
  • 'A million other possibilities that small minds don't consider before diving straight down the plug hole for reasons know only to themselves but suspected by many' :))

Awww man. Just some of the pseudo-logic on display in here that has made my night. Set me up nicely for the match. Cheers peeps.
I suspect threads like this bring out the Timmy ringers on FF, as some of the comments, without any great knowledge of the facts, and with the only input from the SPFL legal team (!), are beyond belief.
 
The businessman instructed lawyers to go to Scotland’s highest civil court to seek a resolution.
Rangers, though, have hit back to say that isn’t the case.

They told the BBC: “Cinch approached Rangers to discuss commercial opportunities in early 2021.

“Rangers provided information on what opportunities might be available.

“This is common practice for our commercial team.

“At no point did cinch offer any terms to Rangers.

Journalism in a nutshell

The Sun run a false story. The BBC pick up on a tweet from the club, and paint it as Rangers talking directly to them

At no point are they telling the truth
[/QUOTE]
 
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It could be reported in a such manner to make it look like cinch walked away from sponsoring us, and we've taken the huff & as a result refused to comply with the league sponsorship
It could be. And we would still be within our right to do so.

Put another way, if Cinch had offered enough money to sponsor us, we could have gone to the third party, told them we had a beneficial deal and got agreement from them. It never materialized so it’s a moot point. The deal that did come to us wasn’t acceptable to the third party. Since the third party has a vested interest in Rangers, I’d say the said third party here is still holding all the aces. Of course I’m not a lawyer so there might be something in the law, that will be the job of the SPFL legal team to prove.
 
Regardless of it all. If just looking at what was said in court they can ram the renaming of the stadium. Fucking shite that wasnt acceptable when it was SD and shouldn't be now.

Say they were offering £25 million for 5 years, would you still be against it?

Personally I don’t have a problem with it, Ibrox will always be Ibrox to me no matter what company they put on front of it.
 
It looks to me that there was never any negotiations with cinch. Not only that there was never an offer from cinch to negotiate on.

we probably have a list of opportunities for sponsorship that we give to all prospective sponsors who show an interest in our Club. Stadium naming rights is probably in there as a kite flying exercise to guage how much someone is daft enough to offer. It’s better to know the going rate that you are excluding ourselves from rather than being blind to the potential value.

The SPFL are grasping at straws
 
Couple of things I’m hoping here.
Firstly, for all we know our “talks” with cinch may have been about naming rights next season, or maybe even before the May 21 contract with Park.
Secondly the SPFL are actually competitors to us when it comes to securing contracts for sponsorship. So, we would never provide them with the full details of the contract. We could only ever provide them with a heavily redacted document to protect ourselves.
If we didn’t do that we’d be seriously jeopardising our ability to secure a contract with a company the SPFL we’re considering also using. I also don’t trust the SPFL not to disclose such contract details to another club or two.
It's the judge requesting the contracts not the SPFL.
 
The issue isn't with cinch, and the SFA and SPFL don't have any issue with any discussion we did or didn't have with cinch. They have an issue with us, us being the big bad Rangers so get it right fucking up them.
The redactions pertain to the Parks contract surely?
The albeit bizarre link with cinch didn't need to be mentioned and has no relationship with the current legal matter. It's scum behaviour, welcome to Scotland
 
Don’t think it’s gonna go bust anytime they are hoping for a 5bn valuation on the stock exchange and just has a 500 million investment.
Thanks for the financials. I just thought that with all the exposure and the millions being splashed around it looked like it wouldn't last.
The (buy your car) (sell you a car) companies are springing up like Snowdrops.
 
So without trawling through 8 pages of bickering have I got this right.QC announced we were I talk with cinch regarding naming rights this trying to muddy the waters regarding our current dispute with spfl?
We have announced they made an offer and at no time did we enter negotiations with them?So they are trying to get Mr Parks motion of being involved thrown out?
 
They told the BBC: “Cinch approached Rangers to discuss commercial opportunities in early 2021.

Rangers provided information on what opportunities might be available.

“This is common practice for our commercial team.

“At no point did cinch offer any terms to Rangers.”


This is likely to be the truth of it, IMO.

The Sun / SPFL are hanging on the bit underlined as evidence that we were amenable to dealing with cinch when it suited us when it reality it was simply standard protocol.
 
It's the judge requesting the contracts not the SPFL.
The Judge isn’t asking for anything mate. Lord Keen, representing the SFA, asked for the full details. The Judge didn’t, in granting leave to Appeal, grant Lord Keen’s request to see the full details of the Rangers/Parks contract:

“Given I have granted leave I do not propose to make an order for Lord Keen’s motion.
 
The relevance is we have no conflict of interest with Cinch and therefore have no reason to not display their brand, if Parks motor group were willing to name the stadium 'cinch Ibrox' with no issues then, why is there an issue now?

I sincerely hope we've not just stood on our own fucking dicks AGAIN!
Alternatively we have a grudge against cinch as they decided not to go ahead
 
We can't claim that the Cinch league sponsorship deal undermines our other commercial deals if we're then looking to sign a deal with the same company. The argument that Parks may have agreed a mutual termination of any agreements they had with the club if the Cinch naming rights deal offered more money doesnt really hold any sway. We were willing to sell our stadium naming rights to Cinch. We were negotiating that at the same time as the SPFL were doing their league deal. Our argument against displaying the league/cinch branding really would be massively weakened if we were essentially in discussions about the prospect of playing our home games at The Cinch Ibrox Stadium.

You are wrong.
Firstly, considering an offer of sponsorship does not implicate any ‘willingness’ whatsoever.
If I knocked on your door and offered you £5000 for your house, you wouldn’t have been ‘willing to sell’ I would have merely asked the question
There is no evidence of negotiation at all. The Sun has picked what it wanted to quote to imply that.
Secondly, the deal with Parks may well have been structured to only allow a competitor any branding at a price greater than x, whereupon Parks would wave their rights.
There is no information to support your claim at all.
 
It looks more a response to a question than an actual statement. Have the club actually released it anywhere?
I still don’t see anything on the Rangers website or posted from the official Twitter account.

you could be right in saying they view it as just a response to a question , but again Rangers not great with their communication imho
 
So did the club provide a list of sponsorship opportunities to Cinch they would have considered or did they tell them they couldn’t enter into a sponsorship agreement with them as it would conflict with the Park’s deal?

I think that question and exactly what any list of opportunities had on it would be critical to the debate here.
 
And? If the price was right, why would that be an issue?

The conflict is about undermining current deals - presumably Rangers would receive considerably more for renaming the stadium than the paltry amount they would receive from league sponsor, so it in no way undermines or creates conflict with any existing agreement.
I totally agree with you - but there obviously was a reason for binging it and I just think that it was an attempt by their lawyer to paint us in a bad light.
 
The Judge isn’t asking for anything mate. Lord Keen, representing the SFA, asked for the full details. The Judge didn’t, in granting leave to Appeal, grant Lord Keen’s request to see the full details of the Rangers/Parks contract:

“Given I have granted leave I do not propose to make an order for Lord Keen’s motion.
You are correct. Thanks for clarifying.
 
I think a fundamental point is this:

If Rangers chose to either break a contract with Parks, or enter into renegotiations with Parks in light of a proposal from a third party (cinch) - that is completely up to them.

If the SPFL actually force Rangers to break a contract with Parks, or send them back into renegotiate with them (with very little bargaining power now) - that is completely different and, IMO, completely unacceptable.
 
I haven't read the entire thread but my information is that cinch did indeed offer us a deal prior to their deal with the SPFL and that deal was worth a lot more than the SPFL one.

It is a big step from there to suggest that Rangers were negotiating with cinch. An offer may have been made and declined for the same reasons we refuse to be a part of the SPFL deal. The key point is that Rangers did not make a deal with cinch.
How can this be explained to someone who is hard of thinking or short of intelligence, say, a Celtic fan who’s a full blown sevcoite?

I mean, I understand perfectly what your saying but these people need this explained in very, VERY simple terms. They seem to believe that Rangers got in touch with cinch and tried to do a deal, then the SPFL swooped in and did the deal instead. They are firmly of the opinion that Rangers have balls’d this up. I don’t believe that for a second.
 
Unbelievable that for the second year in a row the league body, set up for the benefit of the clubs, are in court against one of their clubs. Resign.
 
Probably mentioned already but I’m reading this as Cinch came to us first and couldn’t afford it, so decided it would be cheaper to sponsor the entire league.

I’m totally against renaming the stadium unless it’s enough money to safeguard the future of the club for 25 years or more.
 

Rangers held talks with sponsor cinch to rename Ibrox stadium​


The Court of Session heard Rangers held talks to change the stadium’s name to cinch Ibrox

The Court of Session heard Rangers held talks to change the stadium’s name to cinch Ibrox
JANE BARLOW/PA

Rangers FC’s parent company held talks to explore renaming Ibrox stadium with a firm that secured an SPFL sponsorship deal, a court has heard.

Lord Keen of Elie QC said executives at Rangers Football Club Ltd had discussions with an online car retailer about rebranding the club’s stadium as cinch Ibrox.

The advocate spoke during a Court of Session hearing in which the Scottish Football Association was granted permission to appeal against an interim interdict which forced the SFA to comply with its own guidelines on arbitration.

Rangers are refusing to allow branding on team shirts or an advertising hoardings by cinch, the retailer which signed an £8 million sponsorship deal with the SPFL.

Douglas Park, the Rangers chairman, believes that the deal breaches acommercial agreement which has been made between his company, the motoring group Parks of Hamilton, and Rangers FC.
However, today Keen said his legal team had received a heavily redacted document which claimed to be a contract signed in May 2021 between the club and Parks.

Keen, who is acting for the Scottish Professional Football League Ltd, said his colleagues had been told the redactions were due to “commercial sensitivities”.

The QC told Lord Braid that Rangers Football Club Ltd had also been involved in negotiations with cinch.

“The fact is that right up to June 7, Rangers Football Club Ltd was negotiating with cinch to sell them the naming rights to Ibrox so it became the cinch Ibrox stadium and of course that was a proposal of considerable value to Rangers Football Club Ltd,” he said.

“We do have considerable doubt about the way in which this document has been produced and redacted and we would invite your lordship to direct the petitioners to disclose the full contract to your lordship in a sealed envelope in order that the purported redactions can be examined and the issue of commercial sensitivity determined, as it is a matter under the court.”

The SFA’s lawyer, Roddy Dunlop QC, asked Lord Braid for permission to appeal the interim interdict to the Inner House of the Court of Session. Dunlop, the dean of the Faculty of Advocates, said legal tests showed that the SFA had the right of appeal.

He added: “There is an urgent need for a swift decision.”

Braid granted permission for the SFA to appeal against the decision. He said that because he had granted the SFA’s request, there was no need for the unredacted document to be given to the court.

He added: “For these reasons, I do propose to grant leave to reclaim. Given I have granted leave I do not propose to make an order for Lord Keen’s motion.”
 
How can this be explained to someone who is hard of thinking or short of intelligence, say, a Celtic fan who’s a full blown sevcoite?

I mean, I understand perfectly what your saying but these people need this explained in very, VERY simple terms. They seem to believe that Rangers got in touch with cinch and tried to do a deal, then the SPFL swooped in and did the deal instead. They are firmly of the opinion that Rangers have balls’d this up. I don’t believe that for a second.
Either way, Rangers still have the right, in the SPFL’s rules to reject cinch being highlighted at Ibrox.
 
Why would the SPFL go to court and appeal the decision on Parks being a party to the arbitration? Why is it important for the SPFL to exclude them?

Presumably because Rangers are bound by the arbitration per SPFL/SFA rules but Parks are not. Therefore, Parks could take any adverse arbitration decision to the Court of Session. That makes a 'stitch up' impossible.
 
It's not the sun thats the problem for a change. But the SPFL's QC apparently fibbing in court that is the issue.

I'm not sure he was 'fibbing'. The problem is that 'negotiation' is a hugely ambiguous term.

For example, when still working, I was approached by one of our competitors to go work for them. I said I would need $6 million to cover the loss of my pension rights knowing full well that they would never agree to that because I wasn't really interested but curious to see how far they would go. Technically, I was 'negotiating' even though I never had any intention of doing the deal.
 
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