Carling keep faith with Glasgow giants

Rangers joined forces with Celtic yesterday to celebrate a new bumper sponsorship deal with Carling – and promptly ensured they would still receive that cash if they joined the Barclays Premiership.

The Old Firm clubs will receive a share of £18m (€25.9m) over the next five years after agreeing to extend their deal with the drinks giants.

Carling say they are keen to continue using Scotland’s two largest clubs to promote their brand north of the border but Rangers were quick to make sure the deal would not be hampered if their hopes of playing in England’s top league ever materialised.

Rangers chief executive Martin Bain said: “With most sponsorship deals you try and get a bit of longevity and 2010 is the right deal for Rangers.

“If there was a fundamental change [Premiership] then we’ll be able to facilitate that.

“Some people down south really sat up and took notice when we did the first deal with Carling.”

Manager Alex McLeish refuses to give up the dream of playing in the Premiership one day but admits he fears it may be just that, nothing more than a dream.

He said: “We’re always dreaming about the Premiership and maybe it’s a pipedream.

“I’m sure the people who will dictate that will be the global television companies.

“If they one day say ‘we’re withdrawing our support’ from such and such a competition unless Rangers and Celtic go in then I’m sure there will be support for our inclusion.

“Whether it’s that simple I don’t know, but that seems to be the glaring solution.”

McLeish admits the lack of television money from playing in the Bank of Scotland Premier League means such sponsorship deals are vital to the financial health of the club.

He said: “We don’t generate a lot of television money because of the weakness of the Scottish League compared to England.

“English Premier clubs are earning 10 times the amount of money Rangers and Celtic are earning in television money and it makes Carling’s involvement all the more important.”

McLeish has snapped up four new players so far this summer and is keen to add another two but has been told he must now move players on before adding any more.

Bain praised the manager’s willingness to accept the financial constraints the club now faces.

He said: “We both know where we are financially and all credit to Alex, he is extremely understanding and supportive of the market factors.

“We still have a player budget in terms of salaries that are quite high.

“We’ve spent the [Jean-Alain] Boumsong money in the ways we said we would.

“We’re quite confident we’re building and Alex’s objectives are to always have his own team on the park.

“We have younger legs in the team and we’re trying to help him do that.”