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Well, Raskin was good while he lasted.

I'm going against the grain, I find myself enjoying international football more these days than for a long time. When I started taking a serious interest in football going to watch Scotland was as normal as going to watch Rangers. I barely missed a Scotland home match from around 1982 to 1989 or so. Then, like a lot of Rangers supporters, my interest started to wane. Now I can't actually remember the last Scotland match I attended, certainly it wasn't this century. I'll still watch them if they're on TV, I still want them to win and they still have the power to elate or depress me depending how the performance goes. My expectations are different from Rangers. I almost expect Scotland to disappoint me in a way I don't expect from Rangers. I'll caveat all of that though, Rangers can elate or depress me on a scale Scotland simply can't, or haven't so far. Reaching the Europa League final last season was an incredible feeling, maybe if Scotland reached the latter stages of a finals competition it would feel the same. I'm not sure I'll ever find that out. Losing to Celtic puts me on a downer that so far no Scotland result ever has. Where my enjoyment of international football is coming from isn't directly connected to watching Scotland. I feel international football is simply more meritocratic than club football. The powerful club sides in the bigger leagues are on such different level financially now that frankly the sport is now rigged. It's impossible for a club with Rangers support and history to compete with any English side in their top flight. That gap only looks like it'll continue to grow in the coming seasons. Chelsea spent over £350 million in January, and no one bats an eyelid. When we do produce a decent young player he's taken from us, often before he's even made the first team squad far less played 50 matches for us. We can see this happen all across Europe now, a two tier system is firmly in place. It wasn't always like that. In my formative years clubs like Rangers could expect to compete in Europe against the very best. Clubs like Brugge, Malmo, PSV, Benfica and Porto all made the European Cup Final. They all now struggle to even qualify for the Champion's League. Which is where international football comes in. Spain are clearly lacking in a top striker currently, as they demonstrated on Wednesday night. Now, if it was Barca or Real they'd simply go out and buy the best striker in Brazil or Germany or wherever. Spain can't do that, they need to work with the players they have. That's why we see countries like Portugal, Croatia, Morocco, Belgium, Uruguay and Wales reach semi finals in recent years. The bigger countries will always have an inbuilt advantage simply through having more players to choose from, but smaller nations can compete, they can sometimes do more than compete when they get a handful of very good players at one time. International football is simply fairer. I love that Argentina can have the best player in the world in their side, but they might need to also play a couple of total journeymen in the same team. I miss the Rangers matches during international breaks, but I enjoy watching football that's not as corrupt or imbalanced as club football now is.

Irrespective of what you think of his form this season (and whether or not he should be retained for next), McGregor has been a fantastic servant to the club and well deserving of an honour not many Rangers players can say they've had. I think it's fair to say he's a legend and amongst the very best 'keepers we've had.

I haven't been to the San Siro yet but the females I noticed loitering outside many a Milanese eaterie certainly looked edible.

No, your mind is simply factoring in past occurrences. Our academy, like most I would think, is a trialist factory that produces little. Odds would dictate that he will enter into that system, and never really be heard from again.

I wish him the very best during his time with us but sometimes I wonder, what's the point? He'll almost certainly never play for the first team and the chances of making a penny in return for what he'll cost us over the two years is negligible. Too cynical?

Well deserved recognition.

I think international football reflects exactly the same financial disparity as club football and perhaps to an even greater extent. Other than an occasional blip like Denmark or Greece winning the Euros, success at international level is concentrated in very few countries. Only 8 countries have won 22 World Cups contested so far - the 5 big leagues in Europe and the three to leaves in South America. Ten out of sixteen Euros have been won by four of the 5 big leagues. The correlation between international success and the financial clout of the domestic league is almost total.

Wish it was a weekend fixture 😒

It’s nip and tuck at the top and the same at the bottom we could be in for an excellent finish to the campaign. mon the toffees. ⚽

I always remember that statistic about the weekend years ago when an old firm game took place the same weekend as the take that concert at Hampden. over 30 more arrests at Hamden, and plenty of drunken loutish females peeing in the street. Dont recall anyone blaming Gary, Mark, Howard and the other guy for this behaviour. Take that 'need to do more'.

There has been an update to Chrome recently as well so may be related to that.

If you have 50,000 people at a football match I think it's fairly conservative to say 1% of them are going to be less than positive role models. That's 500 people out of any Ibrox crowd that probably would enjoy noting the behaviour above rather than criticise it. They can anticipate, they can plan and they can react but no football club can fix that social problem.