Former Ibrox vice chairman Donald Findlay says Rangers are a 'new entity' which must establish 'its own history and tradition' 

• e-mail

To the chairman of Cowdenbeath nights with the directors of Rangers are not the occasions they once were.

Donald Findlay QC should be comfortable in the midst of David Somers and co. He was once one of them. Vice-chairman of the company indeed.

But these days he neither recognises the faces or names of the Rangers board. Or, indeed, the 'new entity' – his words – that they represent.

Former Rangers vice chairman Donald Findlay believes the Ibrox outfit are almost like a new side 

Findlay believes Ally McCoist's side is almost like a new team following their relegation to the lower leagues 

'Welcoming them to Central Park will be no different to welcoming anyone else for me,' Findlay tells Sportsmail, a vague waft of pipe tobacco detectable in windowless side room in Glasgow's High Court. 'Why should it be?

'I don't have many old friends there now. None on the organisational side.

'I know Alistair McCoist and Durranty. But I don't actually know who is involved there any more.

'Rangers coming is a big occasion for the club and the town of course. The last time they played Cowdenbeath in a league game was April 1971. The game was originally scheduled to have been played on January 9 – but was postponed because it was the Saturday after the Ibrox disaster.'

This appreciation of the history of Rangers is a feature of the conversation. Findlay, trademark whiskers now greying slightly, is wistful on the past and shows no compunction over turning his legal mind to one of the most heated and prolonged debates in Scottish football.

His learned friend Lord Nimmo Smith may have declared otherwise. But to Donald Findlay the Rangers which visits Cowdenbeath on Tuesday is not the same Rangers he once served.

'It is a different club,' he tells Sportsmail bluntly. 'They may play at Ibrox and they may play sometimes in royal blue jerseys.

'But you cannot pass on that which is undefinable. And that is spirit and tradition and all the rest of it.

'To me this is a new Rangers which has to establish its own history and tradition.

But it's not the Rangers I know. To me, genuinely, it is a new entity.'

Findlay feels sorry for fans of the Ibrox side who have stuck by their club in recent years

In Rangers circles this kind of thing is heresy. When liquidation became inevitable Charles Green, the former Chief Executive, insisted vocally he had paid £5.5million for the assets and history of the oldco in May 2012. Recently, Livingston's programmed editor lost his job after wading into a contentious topic in a match programme.

Asked why he flies in the face of the consensus among Rangers supporters - that they remain the same club they always were - Findlay insists his view is a personal one. In his mind – he is now 63 – things have changed.

'Well, the view I have is one expressed to me by a lot of other Rangers supporters.

'There is just not the same sense of things being done the Rangers way.

'A lot of Rangers supporters – and these are the guys I feel sorry for – paid their money and remained loyal and followed the team through thick and thin. And they tell me there is just something missing now.

'That's not only my view. It's what I am told by people from the inside in the sense that they go to Ibrox. Something has changed, something is missing. It's just somehow… different.'

This sense of creeping disenfranchisement with the running of Rangers is not unusual. Among fan groups talk of boycott is now rife.

Suggesting that a club playing at Ibrox in blue jerseys before Rangers supporters might be a 'new' Rangers, however, triggers a fresh stream of consciousness in one of Scotland's great adversaries.

The former believes Rangers should not move away from Ibrox as the ground is steeped in history

'You can buy assets,' he concedes, 'but you can't buy history. You can't buy tradition. History and tradition are in the heart and in the mind. You can't buy that.

'I don't care what anyone says.You cannot buy Ibrox, you cannot buy the Blue Room, you cannot buy the trophy room without actually understanding what it means.

'I mean what every little piece of it means right down to the crests on the radiators in the Blue Room that were made in the same shipyards which made the Queen Elizabeth liners.'

There is the sense that Findlay, a formidable adversary and hired gun paid to represent some of the most notorious criminals in the country, has given this some thought.

'You could argue that if they (Rangers) had moved from Ibrox to a brand new stadium at the time the whole thing collapsed, called it Rangers and played in blue that you would automatically be taking all that history and tradition with you.

'Well, maybe some people can. That's fine. Good luck to them.

'But for me personally tradition and history is in here.'

He jabs a finger on his left hand towards his heart, an imprint on his black waistcoat clearly evident.

'It's not in material things. It's understanding what the material things mean.

'It's understanding what a genuine privilege it was to walk up the marble staircase.

'Not every Tom, Dick and Harry should trail up the marble staircase at Ibrox you know.'

In recent years, of course, a long process of Tom, Dicks, Craigs and Charlies have done just that. Findlay won't be drawn on what he thinks of this.

'So I'm told,' is all he offers.

He walked up the stairs for the last time 15 years ago. The events which led to a humiliating public resignation have been well documented. Captured on camera at a club function singing 'The Sash' he was subsequently reported to considered suicide. He has no wish to rake over old coals.

'It's so far in the past I'm not going back there. Things happen to you, you deal with them and move on.'

He has revelled in running his hometown club of Cowdenbeath for the last five, fraught years on a simple rule of thumb. Frustrated by the lack of media attention – 'your paper and others treat us like s***' - the Fife club spend only what they earn.

Asked if the history of Rangers might have been different if he had hung around longer to espouse this manta he is mildly dismissive.

'Ach, I don't know. I can't say if I could have changed things if I had stayed longer.Many people have come and gone since then making decisions of which I know very little about.'

Rangers, he claims, were living within their means when he left. The more extravagant spending of the Advocaat years had yet to begin.

'The budget at that time was managed and in control and covered. If you are taking a financial risk it has to be against a background of knowing you can cover that risk.'

He won't deny that the spending at Ibrox was far higher than anywhere else. Rangers unashamedly 'lorded it' over their rivals, including Celtic, and savoured every minute.

One reason, he believes, why there was a marked lack of sympathy among rival clubs when they hurtled towards the fiscal cliff two and a half years ago.

'Looking back on it you do think that sometimes what goes around comes around.

'I mean, come on …. to win nine championships in a row? You are entitled to lord it a bit over the opposition then - and I think we did.

'You knew perfectly well that when you were beaten and your opponents said 'thank you very much' that the minute you left the room they would be aiming a one arm salute at your back. That was fine.

'There was a terrific relationship with the old Celtic board you know. There was nothing personal about it. Chris White and others were personal friends.

'But, yes, it probably did heighten the sense of schadenfreude two years ago. But it was definitely good for business.'

Findlay is not sure if the current crop of Rangers star will be able to win promotion back to the Premiership 

Rangers will have to beat off competition from Hearts and Hibs if they are going to earn promotion

The presence of Rangers in the Championship is equally good for business for Cowdenbeath now. Findlay is under no illusions their presence is a short term situation. How short term is the million dollar question.

'Is it inevitable Rangers will go up this season? Absolutely not.

'I said that before the season started. There is absolutely no guarantee Rangers will go up, far from it.

'They would be one of the favourites from the play-offs because of the resources they potentially have.

'But Rangers, Hearts and Hibs? One of them will be in the Championship next year- guaranteed. Queen of the South and Falkirk are also ambitious clubs.

'So it's by no means guaranteed Rangers will go up.

'I could be selfish and say that suits me fine. I want them for another season in the championship but for the good of the wider game in Scotland it's time Rangers were back in the Premiership.'

He is unrepentant on this. Rangers and Celtic, he believes, are simply too big to fail in a Scottish context.

'They are not just football clubs – they are national institutions.

'They have a presence in sport and also make a contribution to the economy which is huge.

'Of course it's sad to see a great club the way it is. To see Rangers reduced is heart-breaking.

'People lost a lot of money and something had to be done about that. It was wrong the way small businesses and shareholders lost money.

'But has it benefitted the game Rangers being in the lower divisions? Is the game better because of it? I'm not sure it is you know…'