31-year-old Dundee striker Gary Harkins has been knocking around Scottish football for a while now. Having beavered away in the English Football League for five years during the early-to-mid noughties, he returned to Scotland and to Partick Thistle in 2007.
We spoke of his pithy trolling of Rangers on our daily podcast The Racket this afternoon:
Having spent two seasons there, he moved to Kilmarnock, Dundee, and later St. Mirren before transferring back to Dundee. During these years, he played a club which bore the name 'Rangers FC' on a number of occasions.
On a number of occasions during these years, he played a club which bore the name 'Rangers FC'.
And should Dundee overcome Dunbarton in the Scottish Cup, they progress to the quarter-finals where they will face a team with a remarkably similar name to the aforementioned team with whom he jousted in the old days.
This club's supporters are very insistent that it is, in fact, the same club. The mischievous Mr. Harkins, however, wasn't inclined to think the same way. In a press conference, he was asked quite innocently about the prospect of playing Rangers.
They’re just a new club. I’ve not played them before, so I’m looking forward to that. It should be good.
Reporters that were present tell us he was 'grinning' as he said those words and he later disclosed on twitter that it was just a 'wee joke'.
@DerekHowie1 ? just a wee joke pal
— jeebsy (@garyharkins1985) February 22, 2016
Naturally, his wading into corporate law with this comment has caused a ruckus in all the usual places.
FIFA, for their part, are adamant that Rangers FC are the 'same club, absolutely'.
Of course, if we are going to be consistent and proclaim Rangers a new club then we must also insist that the team who play at Turner's Cross are a new club (just one example in this country). And we're not about to be so pedantic.
