SD v RFC Judgement

In what way ?

Let’s be honest here , this will come down to an irreparable future relationship and us paying SDI money . How much money will be the issue after all the legal stuff is exhausted .

We aren’t “ fucked “ as there will be a limit on how much we pay them - yes it may make a big dent in the merchandise money earned , but we were getting Fck all as it stood anyway .

Let’s not over egg the pudding here - it’s been a terrible mess and we will pay the price but after what we have been through , this is manageable , if costly .

Let’s hope lessons have been well and truly learned .
Fucked as in the entire "get it round you SD" idea involving Elite has been named illegal and all profits will go to fatso.
 
It's looking more and more like we might have to talk to SDI. We need merch money and cannot just boycott forever. I personally don't care whether Dave King hates him, the club comes first.
SDI owe us £3 Million in dividends from RRL and just haven't bothered paying it.

You're completely naive if you think it's as simple as just swallowing our pride and buying from Ashley.
 
Not if you join them in one contract, the manufacturing part gets same conditions as the disty part because they are in the same contract.

But if Nike offer to make your tops with Dri-FIT technology, no one else can do that because it's their own intellectual property. Therefore, it can't be matched.
 
Fucked as in the entire "get it round you SD" idea involving Elite has been named illegal and all profits will go to fatso.

Agreed but not fucked as in totally fucked .

We’ve lost, we will payout, eventually , we will move on and be successful . As long as we have learned severe and costly lessons here .
 
SDI owe us £3 Million in dividends from RRL and just haven't bothered paying it.

You're completely naive if you think it's as simple as just swallowing our pride and buying from Ashley.
Ironically we paid them £3m for this new, shiny, glowing contract.
 
But if Nike offer to make your tops with Dri-FIT technology, no one else can do that because it's their own intellectual property. Therefore, it can't be matched.

But they have the right to see it, and offer a match, SDI could then deal with nike direct for the manufacture side.
 
We had the same matching clauses in the 7 year deal that was signed by Sommers and Llambias, so we would have been in this same position at the end of that contract anyway.

The board took a £3 million gamble to end that sooner, that isn’t paying off as yet.

The issue we have here is that the board are no doubt bound by confidentially clauses that restricts them from letting us know their long term plan:))

I don’t doubt for a second that King will try every trick in the book to rid of us of SD, as this is the last thing holding us back.
 
So in essence next season we either work with SD, which many here see as impossible, or we boycott again. And so on.

I see no optimism until a judge agrees that it won't work and a price needs to be agreed.
 
I think people are reading the judgment incorrectly. The judgment makes no ruling on the damage cap, instead it points to the damage cap as a reason why damages alone would not be proper redress for the multi-million pound losses that SDIR have suffered and therefore keeps the matching right in place and goes down the route of the injunction.

Damages wise, I think it's unlikely we will have to pay SDIR any more than £1 million + legal costs. What we end up paying Elite and Hummel who are extremely affected by both the injunction and the matching rights is where the real financial damages will come from.
 
Ironically we paid them £3m for this new, shiny, glowing contract.
We sure did.

I reiterate it appears we've decided to openly be as obstructive and toxic towards them as they are to us, perhaps hopeful in the future a judge will find the relationship is completely untenable and cannot continue.

I'm more worried about the damages due to Elite/Hummell, although it reads like they may have been aware they were in this for a quick buck.
 
I think people are reading the judgment incorrectly. The judgment makes no ruling on the damage cap, instead it points to the damage cap as a reason why damages alone would not be proper redress for the multi-million pound losses that SDIR have suffered and therefore keeps the matching right in place and goes down the route of the injunction.

Damages wise, I think it's unlikely we will have to pay SDIR any more than £1 million + legal costs. What we end up paying Elite and Hummel who are extremely affected by both the injunction and the matching rights is where the real financial damages will come from.
Were the judges own words not 'many millions'?
 
The issue there is that Sports Direct aren’t in the slightest bit interested in having a normal working relationship.

As you said yourself, this is just a bit of sport to them.

They want to use Rangers as a marketing tool for SD or nothing.
Part of the contract is to spend half a million on the megastore. If they do not do this breach of contract get them tae phuck
 
I skim through these threads each time they come up, so excuse me if this has been explained before, but what is to stop say Club 1872 making an offer for all these retails rights at cost, ie, make nothing from the deal over covering costs, with all profits going to Rangers, surely SD would not be interested in matching that deal. Make it a 1 year term, then the season after back to normal with more established players?
 
SDI owe us £3 Million in dividends from RRL and just haven't bothered paying it.

You're completely naive if you think it's as simple as just swallowing our pride and buying from Ashley.
Offset it against what damages are. Judge says you owe £3m just say ok they can keep what they owe us
 
Were the judges own words not 'many millions'?
I've only read some of the judgement, but I think that reads like the damages will be limited to £1m. The judge has to consider firstly if there's been a breach. He's obviously found that there has been.

It looks like this part of the decision is to do with what remedy should be granted as a result of that breach.

I think the argument here is that there should be an injunction against us performing the Hummel contract as damages won't fully compensate them. It won't fully compensate them because the contract limits the damages to £1m.

Can't say for certain because I haven't read all the judgement and the contract is probably governed by English law (and I'm not an English lawyer).

If the injunction is granted, we will almost certainly get sued by Hummel. Who knows if there is a limitation of liability clause in that contract!?
 
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You make it sound so simple - I am amazed it took so many judges years to work it out.

The court time this has taken tells its own story. There is a legal war going on - it still has a long long way to go.

It has taken so long because we've continually appealed and have subsequently had our arse handed back to us on a plate.

It doesn't have a long way to go at all - we're still waiting on whether our appeal will be heard or not. If no grounds for appeal, then that's it - over and done with.

The only ray of sunshine in all of this is, that this is where it ends - no more fucking court cases.
 
Re post 536, thinking about it more, I think the manufacturing rights issue is another example of how devious and complicated the agreement is.

Manufacturing rights are expressly excluded from being "offered rights" which SDI are entitled to match.

Despite this, they can still be a "connected commercial arrangement" if combined in a package with an offered right, such as wholesale distribution. If they are such a connected commercial arrangement, then SDI have the right to match manufacturing rights along with whatever offered right is combined.

I struggling to think of a scenario where a manufacturer doesn't distribute to some extent (maybe others can think of one.) I think manufacturing will therefore probably always be a connected commercial arrangement to an offered right.

So it seems to me that although the contract appears to exclude manufacturing rights from being "match-able," in practice it does the opposite.
 
I've only read some of the judgement, but I think that reads like the damages will be limited to £1m. The judge has to consider firstly if there's been a breach. He's obviously found that there has been.

It looks like this part of the decision is to do with what remedy should be granted as a result of that breach.

I think the argument here is that there should be an injunction against us performing the Hummel contract as damages won't fully compensate them. It won't fully compensate them because the contract limits the damages to £1m.

Can't say for certain because I haven't read the judgement and the contract is probably governed by English law (and I'm not an English lawyer).

If the injunction is granted, we will almost certainly get sued by Hummel. Who knows if there is a limitation of liability clause in that contract!?

Hummel and for that matter elite would have known exactly what they were getting into with ourselves and the SDI contract . They aren’t suddenly going to sue us .
 
Nothing is close to being concluded yet, this will rumble on until at least the end of the season and nothing can be done until then.

Hummel will not supply SD so they can't have our top next season either.

Elite took out a 10 year lease on the gers store so I doubt they fancy seeing their highest profile client disappear so easily or without a fight.

We just spent £4M on a sweedish defender so it's safe to say nothing has changed and won't until at least next season.

I reckon it will get to a point where both parties eventually agree a fee to end this completely once and for all.

At the moment all we can do is wait to see when the appeal will be heard.

Unfortunately i don’t think Ashley is interested in making money from us anymore. This is personal between him and King and he’s intent on fucking us as much as possible.
 
It has taken so long because we've continually appealed and have subsequently had our arse handed back to us on a plate.

It doesn't have a long way to go at all - we're still waiting on whether our appeal will be heard or not. If no grounds for appeal, then that's it - over and done with.

The only ray of sunshine in all of this is, that this is where it ends - no more fucking court cases.

My mistake, maybe it really was that simple after all.;)
 
Fat Mike & Sports Direct wont be getting a penny from me ever.

It’s easy for me to say being an overseas Bear but the support as a whole need to be far more militant over this.

There’s still idiots that use the megastore FFS!
Correct and not just a few it need to stop if even to let fat boy we are serious because he must be laughing at us.
 
It's looking more and more like we might have to talk to SDI. We need merch money and cannot just boycott forever. I personally don't care whether Dave King hates him, the club comes first.
I think the problem is sdi don't want to talk,they just want their (as they see it) money..DK previously tried to speak to the fat man but he wasn't interested.
 
I think the problem is sdi don't want to talk,they just want their (as they see it) money..DK previously tried to speak to the fat man but he wasn't interested.
I'm trying to be optimistic. I cannot stand the thought of a permanent boycott. It's so depressing.
 
This bit is difficult to get your head around, but I think the position is that SDI don't have a right to match an offer to manufacture if that offer is free standing. Manufacturing isn't one of the things the have the right to match.

They do however have a right to match if manufacturing is part of an overall deal which includes any of the things they have the right to match. The manufacturing then becomes a "connected commercial arrangement" for the purposes of the contract.

In the Hummel case we offered the right to manufacture together with the right to wholesale distribution. The right to wholesale distribution was one of the things they had the right to match. That meant SDI had the right to see the whole of the Hummel deal and match both the distribution rights and the manufacturing rights - which had become a connected commercial arrangement.

Para 76 - "Rangers chose to bundle wholesale distribution rights (which are, as I have found, an Offered Right) together with manufacturing rights as part of a proposed composite deal which subsequently became the Elite/Hummel Agreement. If a separate deal had been concluded in respect of manufacturing rights then SDIR would have had no right to match it. When, however, the right to manufacture was offered as part of a bundle, or deal, or package that also included one or more Offered Rights that right to manufacture became a connected commercial arrangement."

So would I be wrong in thinking a future argument maybe that the manufacturing and distribution rights had to be bundled together as Hummel will not supply SD due to their business practices, or am I grasping at simple straws?

Cheers for the breakdown, your first sentence was right, it is difficult to get head around lol.
 
I've been saying this for months.

Get a firm to give us a stupidly favourable deal.

Best case scenario: SDI walk away
Worst case scenario: SDI match it and make %^*& all from us

You don’t really think that’s a legal option but the board haven’t thought of it?
 
Despite this, they can still be a "connected commercial arrangement" if combined in a package with an offered right, such as wholesale distribution. If they are such a connected commercial arrangement, then SDI have the right to match manufacturing rights along with whatever offered right is combined.
What is the judge basing this on though? Is it stipulated in the contract (since it is in inverted commas I'm assuming so) or is it just his opinion based on 'common sense' or precedent?
 
Re post 536, thinking about it more, I think the manufacturing rights issue is another example of how devious and complicated the agreement is.

Manufacturing rights are expressly excluded from being "offered rights" which SDI are entitled to match.

Despite this, they can still be a "connected commercial arrangement" if combined in a package with an offered right, such as wholesale distribution. If they are such a connected commercial arrangement, then SDI have the right to match manufacturing rights along with whatever offered right is combined.

I struggling to think of a scenario where a manufacturer doesn't distribute to some extent (maybe others can think of one.) I think manufacturing will therefore probably always be a connected commercial arrangement to an offered right.

So it seems to me that although the contract appears to exclude manufacturing rights from being "match-able," in practice it does the opposite.
That was my reading as well.
However, the judge seemed disinterested In decoupling any of the elements of the package.
His interpretation appears to be something of a broad brush.
It does seem that Rangers were treated quite shabbily and the Judge was particularly intransigent in his approach in respect of interpretation.
But it must be said, the legal eagles (and Blair) seem to have left us vulnerable to be preyed upon by the vulture that is Ashley.
 
Worrying circumstances, but worth thinking back in Kings history in court cases. When SARS were taking him to court he was happy to concede various aspects of the claim against him, but the case lasted near a decade before an agreement was reached.

He just dragged the thing out for many years until attrition took centre stage and all parties were just happy to agree settlement. I can't help but think he's doing the same here, possibly even expecting SD shareholders to eventually step in an end the bad publicity and worthless drain on resources for the company.
 
It's looking more and more like we might have to talk to SDI. We need merch money and cannot just boycott forever. I personally don't care whether Dave King hates him, the club comes first.

You make it sound here like it’s simply a case of King going cap in hand to Ashley and saying ‘OK, let’s move ahead with you matching Elite terms’ and everything will be fine and dandy. He might well match Elite terms but then there will be a sting in the tail after 12/18/24 months. You know it, I know it, every f*cker knows it. This is not a business relationship and the animosity is not a one-way street. The Fat C*nt will want way more than simply matching Elite terms. Everything that has gone before will tell you that. Surely?

This will need to be terminated officially and legally. No doubt with huge sums of money involved and lots of mud-slinging and gloating along the way.
 
Valley Bluenose
I know, but...not one judge has yet simply said: "This will never work, so £5m will end it". Without means to end contract we have few options.
 
Part of the contract is to spend half a million on the megastore. If they do not do this breach of contract get them tae phuck

Problem with that mate is the judgement seems to indicate that the agreement with SDI apparently says that “termination is not an acceptable conclusion to breach of this agreement” I.e. we can’t get them to %^*& if one party breaks the contract.

This thing seems pretty ironclad, worryingly
 
SDI owe us £3 Million in dividends from RRL and just haven't bothered paying it.

You're completely naive if you think it's as simple as just swallowing our pride and buying from Ashley.

It’s become personal with Ashley and he has “f@ck you” money....enough wealth to tie us up in knots for years. I highly doubt he give a shit about negotiating.

Any bear giving him a penny, no matter what the store is a disgrace.
 
It looks like - to the untrained eye - that the profits made by the Elite deal are going to SDI. So again, no merch money. And yes, it appears we're back to boycotting and being only top flight club in Europe with no merch deal and zero shirt slaesm. And still the fucking judge won't name 'fair price' to buy out the deal. It seems literally infinite in duration.

Our legal team have been fucked without lube. In fact they brought the lube but were ordered not to use it by the judge.

Its giving me the absolute fear. The consequences of this are going to be massive. I cant see how we get out unless King and Jabba can settle.
 
Good chance they’ll stall and won’t bother to give us what we’re due if we have to use Billy Bunters tat emporiums. They’ll just tie us up in court trying to get our money.
 
Worrying circumstances, but worth thinking back in Kings history in court cases. When SARS were taking him to court he was happy to concede various aspects of the claim against him, but the case lasted near a decade before an agreement was reached.

He just dragged the thing out for many years until attrition took centre stage and all parties were just happy to agree settlement. I can't help but think he's doing the same here, possibly even expecting SD shareholders to eventually step in an end the bad publicity and worthless drain on resources for the company.

SDIs battle with Rangers is an irrelevance to the shareholders of the behemoth that is SDI unfortunately. We will barely register on their radar in financial terms. In terms of publicity should we fans choose to make this fight ‘dirty’ then it might catch their attention.
 
People have been making comments along the lines of

"It wouldn't surprise me if the fat man part funded Green & Ahmad's purchase of the club in exchange for everything they just handed over to him. "

There is absolutely no doubt about that, and it's all there in the paperwork, right from the start. The shareholding, laid out in the prospectus was

Charles Green 5,000,200 14.96%
Blue Pitch Holding 4,000,000 11.97%
Mike Ashley 3,000,000 8.98%
Margarita Funds Holding Trust 2,600,000 7.78%
Richard Hughes 2,200,000 6.58%
Imran Ahmad 2,200,000 6.58%
Craig Mather 1,800,000 5.39%
Norne Anstalt 1,200,000 3.59%

So Ashley was one of the main investors in Green's original company.

It is reasonable to say that this relationship led directly to the Rangers Retail arrangement (the previous deal), which then led to this contract.

There is no doubt whatsoever that Ashley has been involved and been manipulating this right from the very beginning.
 
I've been saying this for months.

Get a firm to give us a stupidly favourable deal.

Best case scenario: SDI walk away
Worst case scenario: SDI match it and make %^*& all from us

And in turn we make fuck all from it as well.

Just saying.
 
Valley Bluenose
I know, but...not one judge has yet simply said: "This will never work, so £5m will end it". Without means to end contract we have few options.

Aye mate, I know. This only ends one of two ways...King goes to the Fat C*nt and seeks a settlement for an agreed termination (unlikely because SDIs terms would likely be stratospheric just to f*ck us over) or we continue the legal fight until we get to a point where the Court says ‘enough’.

Otherwise, it’s back to SDI merchandising, back to boycotts etc.
 
People have been making comments along the lines of

"It wouldn't surprise me if the fat man part funded Green & Ahmad's purchase of the club in exchange for everything they just handed over to him. "

There is absolutely no doubt about that, and it's all there in the paperwork, right from the start. The shareholding, laid out in the prospectus was

Charles Green 5,000,200 14.96%
Blue Pitch Holding 4,000,000 11.97%
Mike Ashley 3,000,000 8.98%
Margarita Funds Holding Trust 2,600,000 7.78%
Richard Hughes 2,200,000 6.58%
Imran Ahmad 2,200,000 6.58%
Craig Mather 1,800,000 5.39%
Norne Anstalt 1,200,000 3.59%

So Ashley was one of the main investors in Green's original company.

It is reasonable to say that this relationship led directly to the Rangers Retail arrangement (the previous deal), which then led to this contract.

There is no doubt whatsoever that Ashley has been involved and been manipulating this right from the very beginning.

A follow up question is Did david murray know this , and that the Whyte regime would be superceded by the Green aka Ashley regime ? I think that is a vital answer to be had.
 
The long and short of it is we spent money to get out of a contract we are now stuck with anyway
Dave King and co have fucked it because lets be realistic Ashley would bury us in any appeal.
I know they mean well and I'll be forever grateful to them but they have fucked this up big time.
Can anyone on here be honest and say they felt proud our club was selling strips in a boozer?
We are Rangers and we are meant to be a cut above the rest but we are selling our gear in a pop up shop in a pub.I know it was well intentioned but %^*& me how far have we fallen that supporters would accept that.
I want my club back.Thats all I want
37
We are not selling strips from The Louden, if that's what you are mistakenly saying
 
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