Rangers chairman Dave King doesn't think it will take a lot to topple Celtic and their domination of Scottish football. The South African based businessman was speaking to reporters today about the appointment of Steven Gerrard and how he thinks Rangers only need take one title from Celtic in order to set the cat among the pigeons in the SPL.
We appoint a manager who can win games, with more resources, and we take one league away from Celtic. We only need one league. We don't need two or three. We need one. Once we take one away, it's a pack of cards.
King argued that with Celtic's finances that they need Champions League football every season and that if they were to miss out on the financial windfall from the competition that it would 'change the numbers in the Celtic side very, very quickly':
They have the comfort levels we once had of knowing we were going to get Champions League money. We have to take that away from them and hopefully we have started that process on Friday. The question is, that with Celtic's resources, does it put you beyond them forever? The answer is clearly no.
We have seen the cycle. I was with Rangers when we thought Celtic would never catch up - never in a hundred years. Dick Advocaat said they would never, ever catch up. I think it lasted 17 minutes of the next game we played against them (Celtic's 6-2 win in August 2000.)
They caught up with us 17 minutes into the next game and then went past us because Martin O'Neill came in and figured out a different way to do it.
King also announced plans to launch a new share issue"immediately" with the goal of raising funds to help Gerrard put together a squad to challenge Brendan Rodgers' side. King was asked whether the investment in the club will spur Celtic to invest in their own squad, and the 62-year-old stated that he expects a reaction from their local rivals:
One would expect a reaction from Celtic to the appointment of Steven - we will have to wait and see what it is. With all Celtic's resources they are not a million points away from Aberdeen or Hibs. They have resources that are far less than what we have at the moment.
We are bringing in a manager we think can tip the balance in our favour. Celtic might be over-resourced but you can still only play 11 players. They have a big squad earning a lot of wages but these wages are not all getting on the pitch. There are opportunities there.
