O.K I said I was only going to post old blogs I had up my sleeve but I feel I must make my opinion known on this subject.
But in doing so I will be also posting a topic on a couple of the subjects I have not yet posted.
O.k lets deal with the facts
Ian Black issued with Notice of Complaint
Monday, 19 August 2013
The Compliance Officer Vincent Lunny has issued the following Notice of Complaint:
Alleged Party in Breach: Ian Black, Rangers FC
Dates: 4th March 2006 to 28th July 2013
Disciplinary Rule(s) allegedly breached:
Disciplinary Rule 22 (Season 2012/13 and preceding Rules and Articles):
(1) By betting on three football matches on then-registered club not to win.
(2) By betting on a further 10 football matches that involved then-registered club.
(3) By betting on a further 147 football matches.
Principal Hearing Date: Thursday, 12th September 2013
Mr Black has until Monday 26th August 2013 to respond to the complaint.
Disciplinary Rule 22 (Rule 33 in updated Judicial Panel Protocol for season 2013/14): No club, official, Team Official or other member of Team Staff, player, match official or other person under the jurisdiction of the Scottish FA shall bet in any way on a football match (except authorised and registered football pools).
Please note that there is no evidence to suggest any breach of Disciplinary Rule 23 (Rule 34 in updated Judicial Panel Protocol for season 2013/14).
Disciplinary Rule 23, for reference: No club, official, Team Official, other member of Team Staff, player, match official or other person under the jurisdiction of the Scottish FA shall knowingly behave in a manner, during or in connection with a match in which the party has participated or has any influence, either direct or indirect, which could give rise to an event in which they or any third party benefits financially through betting.
Despite the jokey pun headline I take this very seriously not only as a Rangers fan but as a one time very keen Gambler.
The notion that players are betting on themselves or against gives the common old fan and punter the shakes.
My personal opinion is that Ian Black should be treated as innocent until proven guilty. Something that is quite a new concept in regards to Rangers from the media and other teams and fans.
But in the meantime Ian Black should be withdrawn from all Rangers games until this case has been heard and adjudicated on.
Not because of presumed guilt but I think it would be best for player,club and fans. That is just my personal opinion.
Vincent Lunny in making the decision to make a Rangers player yet again the trial case for this just like he did when newly into the job decided to single out Rangers Sone Aluko and give him a Two match suspension for Simulation.
Has opened up a can of worms if the rule book is to be applied evenly to all professional football players under his jurisdiction.
I mean are we going to see witch hunts for former players who have openly admitted betting on football games and see the attempted stripping of titles from teams.
Players like John Hartson who has openly admitted to having a gambling problem that nearly ruined his life.
He has openly admitted was hounded over gambling debts and once owed more than £300,000.
Who’s to say he never threw a game or gave out insider information to help minimise his debts?
I mean if Vincent Lunny is going back seven years in the case of Ian Black how far back is he willing to go in his quest in cleaning up the Scottish game?
From October 2006 under the headline of
HART RULED HEAD WITH JOHN’S GAMBLING
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/hart-ruled-head-with-johns-gambling-646307
The Daily Record sister publication the Daily Mirrors DEREK McGOVERN writes
FAR be it from me to question the recall of John Hartson, but the Welsh striker and accomplished head-volleyer seems to have his wires crossed in his soon-to-be-published autobiography.
Hartson’s a well-known, no-frills punter. With him there’s no messing about. It’s all on the nose, be it bet or boot.
But surely his memory of one of his few winning bets is questionable. It was on a football match – unidentified – that ended 0-0.
“I had £2000 on the draw at 9-4,” he writes.
“I had £2000 on the half-time and fulltime scores being the same at 6-1, £2,000 on 0-0, which was 7-1, and £2,000 on no goal being scored at 9-2.”
“I cleared £60,000 because of a boring, no-score bet.”
So a 0-0 draw was 7-1, but Hartson also backed ‘no goal-scorer’ – pretty much the same thing – at 9-2. No wonder he went skint.
its all there in John Hartsons autobiography what was the unnamed match did it involve a Scottish team? was it his team? was he playing in it? surely this needs to be investigated?
or is Vincent Lunny going to go further than seven years further than John Hartsons career into players like Frank McGarvey who according to the Daily Mirror again in 1997 under headline
FLASH FRANK TOOK CASH FROM MY PURSE TO BET.
Talks about how Ex-Scotland and Celtic ace Frank McGarvey took cash from his wife’s purse to feed his gambling addiction. Fed-up with years of hardship, wife Pauline says she can stand it no longer and is suing for divorce.
Scottish Football is full of these disaster stories.
But as Kevin Kyle and Kevin Twaddle were saying last night on the news it isn’t a thing of the past it is in fact ENDEMIC in modern football
ENDEMIC?
pretty strong words
Lets see how endemic it is with a wee test. Lets compare apples with apples
let’s pick a random team from the same SPFL league as Rangers let’s say….. och I don’t know Ayr united second behind Rangers in the league and we pick a random player say their top striker Michael Moffat.
Ok lets see if Michael Moffat is on social media type into Twitter Michael Moffat
BINGO! there we go
Michael Moffat
@themoff1985TAL
footballer for super ayr utd ayr
wait a minute TAL? TAL as in the provisional IRA terrorist slogan tiocfaidh ar la?
naw cant be must be a reasonable explanation for it surely a professional footballer wouldnt be promoting PIRA anti British terrorism on social media must stand for The Ayr Lads or something?
wait a minute
Nope the TAL is pretty clear after those tweets.
Lets see for any activity of betting activity?
ooops! so I picked a random player form the same League as Rangers and found evidence of apparent Betting activity
Ofcourse this might not be Michael Moffats account (it is) but thats the excuse Ian Black could use too
“a mate wanted to bet so I let him use my phone account to bet”
or the Neil Lennon one
“a big boy stole it and ran away and tweeted it”
but I dont think Ayr United’s star striker can pull that one as he seems to have opened a new account
because as he puts it
but hey a he might have changed his PIRA glorifying fitbaw punting ways eh?
Ah alas according to these tweets he is still a Football Gambling PIRA anti British terrorist lover.
and for the avoidance of doubt that this is Michael Moffat Ayr Uniteds ace striker twitter account.
Now whether the SFA decide to act on this information I could not care a jot.
If they sweep it under under the carpet just like the other rampant evidence of Footballers gambling all over the place.
Then that is more evidence for us it is one rule for Rangers and one rule for the others.
One thing I do know for certain is that Ayr Uniteds Michael Moffat will get a warm welcome when they play Rangers at somerset park on the 6th of October and when he plays at Ibrox.
Now to my next point how did the SFA get their Information?
Was it like in the case of Rangers Tax Case HMRC and Mental Kevin the charity worker @Corsica1968?
High ranking Celtic supporters using their positions in their jobs some breaking the Data Protection act and leak private information in a public forum in the hope that it will damage Rangers?
Do we have a new obsessed Celtic fan mentalist working for Ladbrokes? If so then I can see Ladbrokes missing the blue pound as a Rangers fan Boycott must surely follow if this is the case.
I cant imagine its just Celtic fans that are sad enough to send private information to the SFA so why is it a Rangers player that is being done?
Why is it only being brought to the attention and acted upon by the SFA and not 7 years ago? but only now when Ian Black is a Rangers player?
These are the hard questions that rabid Celtic fan Vincent Lunny must answer properly or else people may construe the fact that he is a Celtic supporter clouds his judgement on football matters.
I have mentioned Vincent Lunny being a rabid Celtic fan before and heres the proof from his university website
http://www.law.ubc.ca/news/2012/sept/09_05_12_alumni.html
It says among other things
Vincent Lunny (LLM, Class of ’97)
During his time here Mr. Lunny took part in several activities, playing intramural futsal and going to Coquitlam at the crack of dawn to see live Celtic and Rangers games. His most memorable moment at UBC Law was joining Professor Hogarth and several other law students on the Unity Train from Vancouver to Ottawa during the spring of 1997. “Five days of music, playing cards and watching the stunning Canadian countryside rolling past at a very civilized pace – through the Rockies, the plains and the Northern Shield. It was the year the Red River flooded in Winnipeg and my memories of the water alongside the railway lines are still vivid.”
There you have it “During his time here Mr. Lunny took part in several activities, playing intramural futsal and going to Coquitlam at the crack of dawn to see live Celtic and Rangers games.”
Now I consider myself a big Rangers fan but big enough to get up at the crack of dawn in a foreign country travel miles just to go and watch Rangers. Remember this is in 1996/ 97 this is during Rangers 9 in a Row domination that takes dedication from a Celtic fan like Lunny.
But wait is there something more sinister to mr Vincent Lunnys and the SFA hardline stance on Rangers?
In his university blurb it says his hometown is Motherwell
Is Mr Vincent Lunny any relation to sheriff william francis lunny aka Frank Lunny?
The second in command in knights of the equestrian order of the holy sepulchre to the Grand Prior Cardinal Keith O’Brien in the knights of the equestrian order of the holy sepulchre?
Is Vincent Lunny a member of this secretive Jesuit opus dei type zealot organisation?
Just like Sherrif Frank Lunny son Mark Lunny is?
From an organsation that had it was a masonic order boys club thrown at it for over a 100 years.
I think the new transparent SFA owes us some answers to my simple questions