St Mirren join anti-Rangers stance

Rangers’ plans to enter the Scottish Premier League next season as a newco have taken a further hit.

St Mirren have become the seventh club to raise objections over their application, joining Aberdeen, Hearts, Inverness, St Johnstone, Dundee United and Hibernian.

The Glasgow-based club had hoped to ease their financial worries by competing in the SPL next term, but they required an 8-4 vote in their favour ahead of a meeting planned between all of the clubs next week.

St Mirren chairman Stewart Gilmour told both Rangers manager Ally McCoist and chief executive Charles Green in person that he opposes the move, and has now decided to speak about why his club came to such a decision.

“I met with Charles Green, Alistair McCoist and other representatives of Rangers newco last week,” Gilmour said.

“I made it perfectly clear that our directors’ view was that our club would not be voting for a newco entry to the SPL, directly to the officials of Rangers newco,” Gilmour said in a statement.

“This meeting was held in confidential circumstances to allow both parties to enable the other to see their respective positions. A very positive meeting was held.

“However, the position of St Mirren has not changed and our stance of sporting integrity was maintained against the very pressing commercial arguments.”

Gilmour believes an SPL without the presence of one of its biggest and most attractive clubs has already had a knock-on effect with others already counting the cost of their decision.

“Regrettably, the commercial, and hence financial, impact is still not clear to the club. We are very hopeful that this aspect will become clearer in the next few days,” he said.

“It has been impossible for the clubs to downsize as quickly as we would like due to the contractual obligations of the club.

“These are considerable and must be maintained to ensure the club does not slip into the fate of others. It is possible that major cutbacks may have to be made within the company.

“This may well involve people in the club losing their employment – not a good situation – so please accept that the club will be unlikely to be signing any new players until this situation is clear.”