Of course the Record hyped the story - but they did get this line into their second day's coverage which shows that Mr Plod did indeed use this as the pretext for the ban - "GMP also confirmed our revelation that the decision had been made following discussions with other English forces who have handled Rangers games as far back as 10 years ago."
Ten years ago a Sunderland fan was slashed when Rangers visited the town - two days later Scotland awoke to the news that there had been a riot (news obviously not noticed by their reporters at the game!) of devastating scope had occurred. In fact, most fans at the game were unaware of any bother whatsoever.
Because of the horror in Sunderland over the slashing the police down there stuck out a list of incidents from the day to the Scottish Sun to try and create the impression they were over-stretched. I know of two incidents which were concoctions. One was listed as a car break- in by two Scots - when in fact it was the then Chairman of the Scottish Young Conservatives and a friend who had called for police assistance when he managed to lock himself out of his own car by leaving the keys in the ignition! The local bobbies did the needful with the old bent coat-hanger routine.
If the two incidents I could ID as being snide involved bending of the truth then how many more of that list were “tweaked”? I informed the club of this at the time but as usual the “dignified silence” routine kicked in and the Rangers PR heads went into the sand.
The Scottish media now has a modus operandi of sending news reporters to games abroad or down south with the express purpose of finding trouble. If they don't find it some of them will make it up.
A classic came at the Shelbourne game played at Tranmere where one sports hack - again two days after the event when someone decided ‘a riot' had occurred - claimed that he had “feared for my life.” This was somewhat difficult to credit as one of his colleagues described to me how the scribe in question had in fact witnessed the arrival of the Shelbourne bus, complete with jeering crowd, through a window high above the scene as he was INSIDE the ground.
Yet, because the club do not challenge the distortions they become “fact.” Let a few examples of hype, exaggeration, omission, lying, etc, go unchallenged and ten years later lo and behold if someone doesn't trot them out in a nasty little list.
You can see something very similar happening right now with Spiers' scribblings about Gattuso. It goes against the grain for Spiers - in fact it sticks in his throat like a half pound of phlegm - to have a former Rangers player captain AC Milan or win the World Cup. So off he goes claiming fans didn't rate him in his time at Ibrox, etc, etc. Your views; my views; the reality of how fans loved Rino; will not be recorded by the Herald. So in ten or twenty years time when a researcher looks into the files all he will find is Spiers' filth.
That's how propaganda works.
The Bolton fiasco encapsulates so much of what is wrong about the way the club has been run. The neglect of truth, of PR, of our history and our culture has come home to roost.
When we should be raring to go ahead of the first Paul Le Guen season the atmosphere at Ibrox is as flat as a pancake. Life-long Bears are utterly despondent. It's been stamped flat by UEFA and Bolton. Both of these were entirely avoidable - but only if work had been done day in and day out for years. RFC simply didn't take care of the basics that most orgaisations with a public face do.
We've banged on for years in the fanzine and on the website that poor PR is costing us dear - it makes the experience of supporting Rangers less enjoyable; it puts off neutral fans; it makes it easier for the disillusioned to walk away. Yes - it is that bad.
And yes - it is that simple to solve.