AND the folk who ran around London yesterday thought they'd been in a marathon?

Try the Rangers saga. There was a point on the radio on Saturday evening when Paul Clark twice referred to what the Bill Murray bid could mean at Ibrox. It gets to everyone in the end, this administration fatigue.

There isn't a Bill Murray in this entire carry on, although plenty has been 'Lost in Translation'. Maybe Clark had let his thoughts drift to a hybrid Bill Miller/Paul Murray proposal as Rangers' panacea. Why not, it's no dafter than some of what's gone on already.

The daily drip-feed of absurdity will carry on. Today is another D-day, the latest "deadline" which may or may not move things an inch or two closer to clarity. The 65-year-old American Miller pumped out a long and rambling statement on Friday in which he painted himself as the guy who was serious about saving Rangers while all the others were blowhards offering empty rhetoric. In the next breath he said he'd step back for 48 hours to let others come in and beat him to the punch. Eh? Either he wants Rangers or he doesn't.

Who tries to buy a house but withdraws from the bidding at a crucial point to let others deliver a deal? "I will agree to 'stand down' until Monday, April 23rd to allow any and all 'saviours' to step up and claim the club," he said. It's all very well interpreting that as a move which would bring things to a head and "flush out" Murray and The Blue Knights, but what did it say about Miller's actual interest in owning Rangers?

Why Miller's bothering with any of this remains unfathomable. So was the time and effort Bill Ng and his Singaporeans put into flirting with Rangers then taking fright. Neither Miller nor Ng have set foot in Glasgow during all of this. Why not? There isn't any money to be made from running an SPL club – the old chestnut about new, untapped markets doesn't wash any more – so why bother with the hassle unless you are a genuine supporter? Miller had plenty to say in his statement but he was noticeably short on detail when it came to how much he'd spend on Rangers if he actually got them.

And then there was his big condition, namely that the Scottish Football Association and Scottish Premier League be brought to heel and let Rangers off for gaining millions of pounds worth of on-field advantages by not paying taxes. Clark tried to clarify that over the weekend by claiming that Miller was actually more flexible than that. Well, that's good of him. Perhaps it was pointed out in a transatlantic call that neither Miller nor anyone else on Rangers' behalf is entitled to "negotiate" their punishments with the SFA or SPL. For the sake of Scottish football's battered integrity there can't be anything for them to discuss except the SFA and SPL telling Miller what is likely to happen and him agreeing to suck it up. Ally McCoist put it perfectly: Rangers are in the wrong here. They need to take their medicine.

Unless his stance has changed enormously since that Friday statement Miller won't be putting any bid on the table today or any other day. The statement was crystal clear that he would bid only if the authorities gave written guarantees of no further punishment. That risible "condition", if applied, will kill his interest stone dead. It is completely undeliverable.

And so the administrators turn again to Murray and the Blue Knights. It would be fair to assume Duff & Phelps haven't been convinced by these blue chip supporters up until now. Do they reckon they can't back up their talk with hard cash? Do they reckon the Knights are anxious about having to live with the fans' expectations as Rangers' saviours?

They aren't the only ones. It's easy to get lost in the detail as dawn breaks on day 70 of Rangers in administration, but in the big picture it's hard to escape the impression that everyone has danced around the edges of buying this club. No party has yet shown it has the combination of money and will to pay £500,000 for exclusive access and land an unconditional bid on the administrators' table.

Everyone's said the same thing about The Blue Knights since day one: their hearts are in the right place. Now let's see if Duff & Phelps rate them above an American proposal which doesn't make much sense.

And Another Thing . . .

Charlie Nicholas, Willie Miller, Jim Bett, Ally McCoist, Brian Laudrup, Paul Gascoigne, Paolo di Canio, Chris Sutton, Henrik Larsson: since its inception in 1978 the Players' Player of the Year award has been won by some of the great talents to grace the modern Scottish game. The release of this season's PFA Scotland shortlist the other day was the latest reminder, not that any was needed, of the general ordinariness being served up to supporters these days.

Charlie Mulgrew, Steven Davis, Jon Daly and Dean Shiels had done more than anyone else to impress. Mulgrew probably has the strongest claim of that quartet (Victor Wanyama's exclusion was a puzzle). But it's been another mediocre season. No 2012 player on the list, or off it, is in the same class as those nine previous winners.