Rangers FC

The State of Scottish Football and can it change for the better? Sunday National, 30 August 2026 Gerry Hassan Another week, another set of controversies about Scottish football. Celtic humiliated in Europe; Rangers looking hopeless and Hibs and Motherwell out, while Hearts continue to fly the flag after a decent away result. The co-efficient of Scottish teams in Europe has fallen from 9^th to 19^th in four years. Broadcaster Danny Baker was overstating things describing this as “a collapse of Scottish football” but journalist Graham Spiers is correct to talk of “the horrifying humiliation” of Celtic and Rangers in another

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Why we need to get serious about sectarianism in modern Scotland Gerry Hassan The National, 7 September 2021 In 1999, within months of the Scottish Parliament’s establishment, composer James Macmillan delivered an address that had a major impact, ruffling feathers and beginning a long overdue debate. Entitled “Scotland’s Shame”, it spoke about our long disgraceful tradition of anti-Catholicism. He suggested that “we as a nation have to face up to the ignominy of our most prevalent if unspoken bigotry if we are to move together into the next millennium with a sense of common purpose.” This sparked soul-searching, the publication

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The Limits of Seeing Glasgow in Black and White Terms Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, 1 September 2021 Last weekend Rangers and Celtic met in the first ‘Old Firm’ derby of the season. Hotly anticipated in some quarters and dreaded in others, it was marked by a Rangers victory with supporters of the club then walking through the city centre singing anti-Irish, anti-Catholic songs full of bigotry and hate, while police officers passively watched them. We have been here so many times before in the strange world of Scottish football that the senses of many are numbed, while others choose to

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After a dramatic season can football resist the pull of corporate capitalism? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, May 26th 2021 The past few days saw the climax of the domestic Scottish football season. One that has been difficult for clubs, players, managers, coaches, and fans as we have all come to terms with a different type of football - and sport – during the pandemic. The past year has seen all sorts of milestones: Rangers winning the league; Dundee returning to the top flight beating Kilmarnock in the play-offs ending Killie’s 28 year run in the Premiership; the return of Hearts

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What do we do about Rangers? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, May 19th 2021 Glasgow Rangers FC have returned to the top of the football game in Scotland. At the same time twice in the spate of two months a section of their fanbase (small but incredibly visible) have trashed parts of Glasgow - engaging in hooliganism, thuggery and violence in George Square and its surrounds. What the above events show is something toxic at the heart of Rangers and a section of their support, along with wider collusion and a malaise in the football authorities. Beyond this there is a

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The Football Club That Refused to Die: The Tragedy and Beauty of Third Lanark Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, January 31st 2018 Glasgow’s history has long been the stuff of legend – the stories of Red Clydeside, rent strikes, the power of shipbuilding, the scale of slum clearance - and of course, football. In Scotland we seem to get too much football and too much bad football coverage. We get a narrow bandwidth of football which results in numerous stories, triumphs, tragedies, and moments becoming forgotten, as we surfeit on a diet of the stale Old Firm (cue a chorus from

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Sorry seems to be the hardest word in Scotland Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, May 17th 2017 Power and privilege seldom likes to have to openly reflect on its place in front of others. Instead, power likes to present its position as a natural state of affairs – to just be, manifesting and imbuing a sense of its own importance. This is how power exerts and expresses itself, from the City of London to senior bankers and the forces of international capitalism. The same is true of Scotland and in recent years this has been aided by, in significant areas, power

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Anniversaries Galore: Are the best days of Scottish football long behind it? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, April 26th 2017 The only excitement this year in senior Scottish domestic football has been whether Celtic will go through the season undefeated in league, Scottish Cup and League Cup, and whether a historic treble is possible. Along with that there are a whole host of memorable anniversaries. The 50th anniversary is coming up - on 25 May - of Celtic becoming the first British team to win the European Cup; while the 50^th anniversary just passed on 15 April of Scotland’s legendary 3-2

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Why Does Football Matter So Much? And is it about something else? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, May 25th 2016 Football saturates Scotland. It fills numerous conversations and dominates spaces, both public and private – and affects attitudes, thoughts and emotions. According to some measures Scotland is the most football mad part of Europe; in others, it comes third behind Iceland and Cyprus. This isn’t just an essay about football - so if you aren’t a football fan, don’t stop reading as this affects you. If you are a football fan – and a partisan follower - let me be clear.

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The Herald and Rangers FC: Noise annoys and listening for the Sounds of Silence Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, February 3rd 2016 A series of illuminating conflicts in the last week - the Graham Spiers sacking from ‘The Herald’ and the J.K. Rowling/Natalie McGarry argument on twitter - show something revealing about modern Scotland. Spiers sacking from the paper, along with Angela Haggerty’s from the ‘Sunday Herald’, brought up numerous issues. One immediate issue was where power lay in the newspaper group – with open disagreement emerging between ‘The Herald’ and ‘Sunday Herald’ editors. More fundamentally it touched upon the legacy

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