Structure and change in professional football: An Old Firm's search for a new market

Abstract

Football in Scotland is dominated by two clubs, Celtic and Rangers. For more than a decade these clubs have been regularly linked with a move out of Scottish football, usually to a league organized in its much larger neighbour, England, or to some form of pan-European league. The discussion of possible structural change within the European football field has been stimulated by adjustments to its financial arrangements. Many of these changes have had a particularly marked impact on clubs in smaller countries within that field such as Scotland. Moreover, the political union, that is the UK, provides a distinct context within which to consider issues of football policy and structural change. Within this context, this paper seeks to use institutional theory to explain the behaviour of Celtic and Rangers in seeking to change the logics of the European football field and to describe responses thereto from other actors in the Scottish part of the field.