Key man in Celtic takeover shares what he's not heard about Rangers in San Francisco amid 'no more money' dig
A key player from when Celtic had a takeover has commented on the 49ers possibly rolling in at Rangers.
A former Celtic figure has provided a review of what Rangers investment could mean for the Hoops and the rest of Scottish football.
49ers Enterprises, the investment wing of the NFL franchise San Francisco 49ers are in talks to launch a takeover of the Ibrox club ahead of the 25/26 season. Celtic have been the dominant force in Scottish football since Rangers were demoted to the lower leagues in 2012.
David Low is best remembered among Celtic fans for his role in being Fergus McCann's right hand man when the US based businessman took control of Celtic in 1994. He comes from a financial background and has provided his take on what Rangers investment could mean.
Rangers chat doesn’t hit USA
He said to the Celtic Exchange, with insight from working with private equity business from San Francisco and a dig at comments made by Ibrox man Dave King: “The game is changing. Maybe Rangers are about to have a Fergus McCann moment. Who knows? You know, that's a game changer because there's only two shows in town in Scotland. At the end of the day, neither Rangers nor San Francisco 49ers have confirmed anything.
“The lead CEO talked round the subject. He didn't actually confirm there's any interest in Rangers. So anything I see is within the context that neither Rangers nor San Francisco 49ers have confirmed anything. This is no more at the moment than a leak, an informed leak out of Ibrox, for whatever reason. It might be to help facilitate season tickets. I don't know. I don't really care. But this is all predicated on a leak that's come out of Ibrox, a planned leak. Nothing, and I'm in America just now, and I do work with private equity in San Francisco. Nothing's come out of San Francisco at all about this.
“So having caveated the situation with that, what I will say is Rangers need to get taken over by somebody with pockets to deal with the challenges that they face, and that is lack of money. Dave King called it investor fatigue. I'll call it no more money, because it doesn't make sense whether you're the late Brooks Milesone or the late Eddie Thompson, it comes a point where your kids go, what are you doing, Dad?
“You can't do it forever and ever and forever, because you'll end up with nothing. And when you end up with nothing, what do you do? You resign from the board on health grounds and have somebody else find the money for you. So Rangers need a deal like this. It makes sense. It is a brand, whether you like it or not. It has a history, and I'm not getting into the new club old thing here, whether you like it or not, but it's an old history. If you look at it in my lifetime, Rangers have been in downhill for 60 years.
“They're not in a good space. The stadium's very old. To go back there, that stadium's even older than the Celtic’s. That club, for my money, needs a minimum of £50 million, if not £100 million, not just to create the architecture, to play the transfer market scouting system, but also the stadium. It really needs an overhaul. It needs a dominating figure. I mean, we have a dominating figure. We had Ferguson, now we've got Dermot Desmond. It needs a short caller, somebody who says what happens, and somebody who's got the gravitas and the money to back it up. Rangers don't have that.
“Bad contracts, bad faith, bad managers, infighting, half a dozen or more chairmen, four or five different boards, getting tossed from pillar to post, and now they find themselves with no money, nobody in charge, nobody in control. So it makes sense to get taken over, or to get serious investment from a wealthy third party like 49ers or somebody else of that ilk.”
Booming profits
It comes as Celtic recently announced a pre-tax profit of £43.9m in its latest set of financial results. Low added: “When all said and done, it's your ability to play the transfer market that makes the difference. Celtic have been consistently above average in doing that for more years than not and that is essentially what's responsible for the cash balance that we have, which off the top of the head is around 70 million.
“It may well be higher than that by the end of the year, depending on how the last four months of the year pan out. But, you know, Celtic's a stable ship, run on a tight financial model. And the figures will never be bad, put it that way. It's just a matter of how good they are and how you spend your money.”