Empty vessel begs for favours

“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.”

These wise words are attributed to President Abraham Lincoln. They also stand as rarely heeded good counsel for certain figures in Scottish football.

On Friday Celtic’s Chief Executive Peter Lawwell announced his satisfaction that the SPL has confirmed the dates of upcoming matches and states his opposition to any altering of the fixture calendar that might give an advantage to opponents.

In doing so, he quite properly defends the interests of the club that employs him – simply stating that the league should adhere to its commitments.

“Thankfully it seems the integrity of the League will not be threatened by playing any more games away from home stadia or by extending the season.

“Clearly, an extension is something which we would be strongly opposed to, as it would further inconvenience supporters and could have a significant effect on the integrity of the competition.”

Fixture congestion is not unique to Scotland – it is a perennial issue in the English Premier League and has led to clubs such as Manchester United and Arsenal making radical changes to their squads, prioritising the league and European cup competitions, or employing squad rotation systems with the intention of avoiding burn-out of players.

It is a fact of life that goes along with success. Occasionally one or two replays or postponements further complicate the issue but changing the conditions of a competition after it has started is not countenanced.

We can only speculate therefore as to what prompted these vacuous comments to Radio Clyde from Rangers Chief Executive Martin Bain.

"It's probably more to do with the fact that there is a points difference at the moment.

"Why would we want to play eight games in four days? Our preference is to extend the season if it comes to that.

"I'm not prone to comment on other's comments but what I would say to you is that to ask this football club to play four games in eight days, when we could be possibly competing in European competition, is not something that I think the SPL would do to be quite frank.”

"Rangers' involvement in the UEFA Cup affects everything, from the co-efficient to Scottish football (as a whole), so I think it would be rather foolhardy to ask us to play four games in eight days."

The story as reported in many news outlets comes from the Press Association Scotland’s reporter, Rangers historian and co-author of, among other titles, It’s Rangers for Me, Ronnie Esplin. One can only speculate as to whether or not Esplin’s impartiality has been compromised in the story headlined "Gers chief senses Hoops fear".

If Mr Bain thinks the suggestion that Rangers should be expected to fulfil their fixture obligations is foolhardy, perhaps he will invite UEFA to indulge his club by bending their own rules.

The club does seem prone to expecting rule changes in their favour. There was apparent bewilderment at Ibrox that FIFA chose to adhere to its own rules over the proposed sale of Daniel Cousin. Maybe UEFA will allow Rangers to play their ties with Sporting Lisbon at a time to suit them.

Of course, amid the growing clamour to have the league calendar altered to give Rangers a competitive advantage over their rivals, some obvious questions have been overlooked:

• Why should Rangers, unlike every other team in British competition, not be expected to fully utilise its squad to cope with any upcoming pressure?

• Why do Rangers currently have the fourth-smallest available squad in the SPL and is this fact relevant to their public request to have the league calendar changed?

• Given the demands on their squad, why then did Rangers transfer out three players and attempt to sell Daniel Cousin during the January window?

If Rangers have been unable or unwilling to assemble and maintain a squad capable of fulfilling their fixtures, it would be foolhardy, wrong and probably liable to legal challenge if their negligence should be accommodated to the detriment of other league members.

The next time Bain is thinking of saying something about Celtic, hopefully he will think of Honest Abe.