Mike Ashley does not seem to be perturbed by popular resentment.

 

In his eight years so far as Newcastle United owner the Sports Direct tycoon has happily downed pints and smiled all about him while Geordie enmity towards him grew. It is a strange policy, in a way, for a retailer whose greatest market is the football public.

If Ashley doesn't mind what people think of him - or at least, fans of football clubs - then he has pitched up at the right place. At Rangers there is an anti-Ashley venom brewing, not least because of his latest move to take out security on Ibrox and Murray Park for the small matter of his proposed £10m loan to the club.

Many in the business community view this as a perfectly right and proper road for Ashley to go down - how else can he get reassurance on the millions he is prepared to plough into the club? - but that is not how it is viewed by many Rangers fans, albeit not all of them.

Fans have staged a protest tonight at Ibrox prior to the game against Hearts, and the online campaigns are going into a frenzy. Will Ashley bother about it? It is hard to believe he remains immune, especially as he has thrown his friend and trusted lieutenant, Derek Llambias, into the middle of all the bile as Rangers CEO. If it comes to it, Llambias faces the unenvied task of persuading tens of thousands of Rangers fans that, in fact, Mr Ashley will be good for them in the long run.

Might he be? Is it possible that Mike Ashley is not the great enemy invading Rangers? It is interesting to see that pockets of Rangers fans are willing to give Ashley a chance, to see if the man who is such a stunning success in his business life can perform some sort of restorative success at Rangers too.

It may not come to that. Ashley may yet be outplayed in the end by his rivals for the Rangers prize. There is Dave King, and the so-called Three Bears of Douglas Park, George Letham and George Taylor, all of whom are jostling for Ibrox power. But none of them - arguably King included - has pockets as deep as Ashley, whose enormous wealth is his power.

It is argued, not without some justification, that Ashley is in it at Rangers purely for himself. Well, he certainly isn't in it to aid the poor, that's for sure. But does Ashley's involvement in football really mean he is up on the deal all of the time?

Some have wondered if Ashley will ever get his £263m back on his lavish purchase of Newcastle United in 2007. He paid £134m for the club and simultaneously provided it with a £129m interest-free loan. That's a lot of money to try to recover, either by year-on-year retail business at St James' Park, or by a sell-on to the next Mr Big.

In recent years Ashley did actually try to sell Newcastle United but failed to find a buyer. "I've made a mistake [in buying Newcastle United]," he said in one of his rare public utterances back in 2009. "I never said I was an expert in football clubs, and of course I regret it. I've tried my best but my best was woefully short."

This was all of nearly six years ago and, when a buyer failed to emerge, Ashley duly decided to dig in for the long haul in Newcastle. So he is at least a man who is prepared to admit his failings. To this day, of course, he is still trying to get out of the Barclays Premier League club.

What remains mysterious is Ashley's impetus for his Rangers involvement in the first place. In Sports Direct terms, with its most recent accounts showing a £2.7bn turnover and £240m in profits, Rangers is but a pebble in the ocean. The club is so tiny in Ashley's wider business empire that it just doesn't seem worth all the hassle. Why bother, Mike?

Yes, Ashley can get some exposure via Rangers, in future Champions League competitions and elsewhere, but it hardly adds up to committing tens of millions of pounds to the club, if that is his plan. There must be another explanation for it. Ashley must enjoy it - the challenge, the chase, the engagement of it all - if he is willing to take all this flak.

In terms of claiming security on Ibrox for a loan, Neil Patey of Ernst & Young explained to me that there are two ways of looking at this. As a Rangers fan, you either take such a deal in your stride, or you feel nervous about it.

"It is entirely normal business practice for any lender to a business to seek some form of security over the assets, to provide protection in the event that the loan is defaulted on," said Patey. "No bank would lend to Rangers, or any other business, without seeking the appropriate security to cover the debt. Rangers giving Mike Ashley security over Ibrox doesn't per se give him any more control over Rangers, so long as going forward Rangers live within the terms of the loan, and repay it when it falls due.

"The sensitivity lies in the Rangers board's previous statements that it would not give security over Ibrox - statements driven maybe more by emotional rather than financial rationale. In addition, I suspect the fans have an inherent fear that Rangers may not be able to live within the terms of the loan, thereby at that stage putting more control into the hands of Mike Ashley through his ability to pursue title to - or the proceeds from the sale of - Ibrox. Were such events to unfold, that would provide Mike Ashley with a very powerful bargaining chip in future ownership discussions."

Other analysts told me that they felt it was "next to inconceivable" that Ashley down the line would ever divorce Rangers from Ibrox, not unless a total Armageddon at the club - yes, another one - took place. But were Ashley, in power, ever to allow that to happen, then his loans would be lost, his Rangers retail deals would be dust, and he would be one of the most hated men in Britain. Unless he is actually a masochist, it is hard to see it happening.

On and on this Rangers saga rumbles. Even Leo Tolstoy would be starting to find this narrative pretty exhausting. In Mike Ashley, though, Rangers have a man who wants to keep a firm grip on the club, and who believes he can make it all work.