RANGERS chairman Dave King has confirmed the Ibrox board will repay the £5million loan to Sports Direct.
The Light Blues chief announced to shareholders at the RIFC Plc AGM this morning that directors had opted to repay the cash to Mike Ashley at a board meeting last night.
Ashley agreed to lend money to the former Rangers regime earlier this year and has launched a series of legal moves in recent weeks.
Read more: Live coverage of the Rangers agm
King said it took 'one hour' to get the commitment of funds from investors George Letham, Douglas Park, George Taylor and John Bennett. Ashley, whose Sports Direct firm control Rangers' merchandise streams, will now be paid back the cash he is owed.
King told around 1,000 shareholders at the Clyde Auditorium: "At the board meeting which we finished in the early hours of last evening, the board made a decision to reverse our previous position regarding the Sports Direct loan.
"I previously felt that loan was something the club was entitled to and shouldn't be repaid. But with the ongoing situation with Sports Direct a decision was made last night that we would endeavour to repay the loan as long as we could raise the funds to do so.
"I'm delighted that once again with the commitment the investors are giving to this club, it took me just one hour to make phone calls and myself, Douglas Park, George Letham, George Taylor, Paul Murray and John Bennett (gave a) commitment for the £5million and we will be advising Sports Direct today we will be repaying that loan."
Referring to the Sports Direct situation, King insisted the board would succeed in gaining more 'mutually beneficial' partnerships in the future.
He said the 'doom and gloom' at Ibrox and Murray Park had gone and that 'positive progress' had been made on the park.
King reaffirmed his '£30million' target to help Mark Warburton's team achieve progress on the park, but admitted a lot would depend on Warburton's strategy. The chairman said he was pleased with value of signings so far and added that promotion to the Premiership was "essential to a positive cash flow going forward".
Managing director Stewart Robertson confirmed that player wages amounted to "circa 40 per cent" of turnover at present.
King also used his speech at the agm to label Charles Green's legal claim 'absurd', after former chairman Green failed in his bid to reclaim legal fees from Rangers at the Court of Session.
Mr Green was forced to resign as Rangers chief executive in April 2013 when allegations of business links with former owner Craig Whyte emerged, although he denied any wrongdoing.
He had also been fined £2,500 by the Scottish FA for making racist remarks in a newspaper interview about his colleague, former Rangers commercial director Imran Ahmad. Green left the club four months later after he had his contract as a paid consultant to the club terminated.
Mr Green and a number of others, including the club’s former owner Craig Whyte, appeared at Glasgow Sheriff Court earlier this month charged in connection with the Sevco takeover.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel