Tannochsidebear

When it gets to the business end of the season you must hit form and have a run of consecutive wins. We have picked up 4 points from the last 12, and 1 of those was a 93rd minute equaliser. It is safe to say we are in anything but good form.

I was saying to all that I believed we had to win the OF game at Ibrox to have any chance of the title, and I took very little comfort from our plucky draw as with 5 of the last 7 games away including the piggery and Tynecastle I thought we would struggle. Turns out we have blown it in the easiest of the remaining fixtures which I didn’t see coming at all so it will take a turnaround of Helicopterian proportions to prevent the bheasts getting into the expanded money spinning CL next season and have a gloating summer. 

I heard the Perth rumour a few days ago, it’s going to be closed doors and announced on Tuesday if there is any more rain, or indeed rain still forecast for Wednesday by then.

I also think, and this is just my guess, that now Dundee have earned top 6, we will be scheduled to play them away again but they are going to have to play their remaining home games at Perth, but there will be fans allowed to the post split games. 

1 hour ago, Devil's advocaat said:

I think big Souttar would really benefit from a Davie Weir, it's finding one that's the issue.

Can’t argue with that, but there are not many that fit the bill in our budget! I’d be happy with ABG (anyone but Goldson)!

3 minutes ago, Gonzo79 said:

I'd guess whatever punishment is decided upon, there'll be a suspension on it.  

Agreed. Dundee will be reminding the powers that be of the favour done 3 years past in email-gate.

Any idea what these supposed range of sanctions would be?

Not that I’m expecting anything of any importance to be applied.

These big games leave no hiding place. Yet again our defence is prone to huge lapses in concentration, mistakes and generally look awful. 

Goldson has long been a concern for me, and I know I am in the minority but he has had one really good season and 5/6 poor ones. What on earth was he doing at their penalty? He is a complete and total liability and is our top earner at £38K pw. He simply has to be offloaded or we will continue to struggle when attacked. We need two new left backs as Borna is done and Yilmaz is unreliable, yet another big game he isn't available for shows a brittleness we cant afford. If the rumoured fee of £6M from Saudi for Tav is correct, we have to accept this. His defending has come a long way but yet again in a big game he makes a howler that costs a goal. I am a huge fan for what he brings going forward and we will not replace him like for like but I think now would be the time for change. 

Butland had a great chance to prove himself on this big stage in front of the England manager and has done dreadfully for all goals. His antics at penalties is not working, stand up and wait to the striker commits, he has been beaten too often down the middle. Less said about 1st and 3rd goals the better and while generally he has done a good job but you have to do it in OF games to become a hero. 

That leaves one CH position which is currently Souttar, a whole-hearted proper defender but not quite the quality to be a regular starter and quite injury-prone up until recently. Alternatives are Balogun and Davies who are both not the answer.

In the last 2 windows we have concentrated on the middle to front positions mainly, this summer it has to be the defence.

4 minutes ago, Gonzo79 said:

The fact that yahoos are even questioning the penalty we got demonstrates just how utterly paranoid they are.

 

It was a stonewall penalty.

The questioning of the penalty is simply to deflect away from the discussion that there should have been a second yellow card issued to Johnston. They all know perfectly well that it was a penalty and therefore it should follow that a yellow card for the mistimed tackle preventing a goalscoring opportunity should have been issued. This for me was the one huge error the officials made (amongst plenty of minor ones) and of course it had a massive influence on the game as if the bheasts were reduced to 10 with about 40 minutes to play we should have gone on to win the game.

2 hours ago, PoohBear said:

I'm pretty sure Celtic were undefeated one season when we won the league. 96 or something?

From my memory (dodgy!) we beat them 1-0 and the other 3 were draws that season. Tims only lost 1 game all season but we won title 

2 hours ago, Rousseau said:

This was the Stick to Football podcast from a couple of weeks ago, featuring Les Ferdinand.

 

They discuss Michael Beale (the video should start at that point). 

 

His discussion about his time as QPR DoF is quite interesting, too, if anyone is interested; the video is timestamped so you should be able to find that section (about the 41:30 minute mark). 

 

 

Any chance you can just summarise what he said? Where do you find the time to listen to all this stuff? I hardly have enough time to catch up on Gersnet never mind podcasts from randoms!!

9 minutes ago, compo said:

Think our captain has missed some penalties recently do we stick or twist and let someone else have a go .

It wont matter for this weekend, we are certainly NOT getting one with this assortment of bottle-merchants and cheats officiating.

Cant believe they have given the gig to Cheatin' Beaton after the recent calling out by Rodgers for his correct calls in their recent game. With the SFA giving Rodgers a 2 game ban that would have covered this match and then bottling it at the appeal this puts Beaton in direct firing line of Rodgers straight away. As if Beaton wasnt scared enough to give a call for us and/or against the bheasts, this doubles down on this. The VAT appointments scare me mightily as well with those two out and out cheats in charge of drawing the lines and choosing which pictures to review and which to ignore. 

We need to be 3 goals better than them on Sunday to sneak a win. Lets hope we are.

No real standouts but I thought Souttar had another good game. He was about the only defender not to blame for their goal! Tav had a decent game but was partially to blame for the goal (btw check out Goldson's attempt at a tackle in the box for a £38Kpw player) plus another missed penalty means I cant give him it this week. Diomande did well in the middle and Dessers took his goal well but missed another easy chance as well.

Apparently our girls did the exact same thing in 2022 and posted photos at that time and nobody said anything. Just looks like anything to take the gloss off a Rangers victory by those with a hatred for all that our club stands for and achieves. It would seem this now even extends to the wummin's game.

4 hours ago, 26th of foot said:

Back in 2012, it was hard watching a Rangers team cast into the lower reaches of Scottish football.

 

There were a few bright lights; Lee Wallace's commitment to the club, Barrie McKay's verve and, Lewis Macleod's determination to prove, 'there can be only one'. I thought Lewis shone brightest, undersold by David Somers for £900,000 and, two appalling knee injuries at Brentford saw the diminishing of what could have been a stellar career. He is only 30 years of age, I wish him every success as Rangers Academy Coach.

Agree with that, he looked to have it all albeit we were operating at a lower level, and was the brightest of the new players coming through.     

5 hours ago, Rousseau said:

How many assists do you think a full-back should be providing? Are you thinking he should be putting up Tavernier numbers? 

 

Take Trent Alexander-Arnold, who I think we can agree is the most creative FB in the PL; He has 7 assists from 34 games, which is around 0.20 per 90. If we extrapolate that to the 13 games Ridvan has played, you would be looking at around 2–3 assists. 

 

I would also argue Ridvan assist output is better because his xA is around 3.5. If our forwards were any good he'd be sitting at 3–4 assists. He is creating the chances. 

 

TAA also has two goals. 

 

Moreover, Ridvan is only 22. Do you not think players can improve? 

 

I think it's worth keeping him for another year or two, and if the injury record continues, then sell. 

 

Punting him – and any player – because he's not exactly what you want at this exact moment is madness. 

 

The sensible thing to do is replace the aging Barisic and keep Ridvan.

He should certainly be on more than 1 goal and 1 assist given the way we play and the level of opponents we face. Perhaps I want too much from him, like maybe just once every 10 corners he gets it past the first man, or that he can actually tackle  in a defensive position or prevent a cross from coming in. You know, old school full back stuff before all this xA nonsense was being used to try to prove that a player everyone can see is sub-standard is actually almost standard in one of 100 categories. The facts are that despite improving hugely, he still is miles short of being good enough IMO. I would try to make a profit on him in the summer, he is clearly desirable elsewhere, but I don’t see him moving anywhere so he will continue to get my full support during matches, and my honest assessment on Gersnet.

1 hour ago, der Berliner said:

He's played for months on the trot now. Maybe we just stop them from flying about for too long? We should keep our fingers crossed for Dessers now.

 

We'll sure look for some LB in the summer, hopefully in addition to Ridvan.

I must admit I am surprised he has been fit for this long, I thought he had only managed a handful of games between injuries. Looking at your link, 1 goal and 1 assist in about 13 games worth of minutes between league and scottish cup since Xmas reinforces my thoughts that he is nowhere near good enough, and we must look to replace this summer or next winter at the latest. While I am pleased to see he has certainly improved his overall play and doesn't give the ball away as much as he used to, he is still fairly poor defensively IMO and not providing enough goals/assists offensively. He has now had the run of games and settling in period so there are no more excuses, he just isn't what we need. However he is very well thought of back in Kebab-land so hopefully we can make some money from him, as he was bloody expensive for such a limited player so hopefully that value has increased over his time with us, winning trophies and playing high profile games in Europe will certainly do that on highlights reels.

2 hours ago, Bluedell said:

Tickets are being sold through Ticketmaster so doubt MyGers would be involved as the club won't know who has bought them.

Splendid thanks BD

I'm hoping this means that we wont be selling these as "other home matches" on the ST renewals which are due out shortly. Due to MyGers points I feel obliged to buy the friendlies and then I try to give away the tickets as friendlies are not for me.

And i'm certainly not interested in going to watch that mob either. Although I did chuckle at their last minute winner against victim FC (English version) at the weekend with a certain dud former loanee firing in a lovely finish. Shame he couldnt have found a finish like that in Seville.

17 hours ago, CammyF said:

Good move for Borna Barisic if true. Would be great to see him leave as a treble winner - been a good servant and value for the £1.5-£2M we spent on him. 

Absolutely, he has been fantastic value when you consider some of the players in the intervening period we have paid a lot more for and got a lot less. A favourite of mine, but the time is now right to move on for all parties. Would also love to see him get two more winners medals before he goes.

On 10/03/2024 at 13:51, Rousseau said:

I was always in favour of retaining Ryan Jack, with the caveat that he would be able to play 20-30 games. 

 

He's only played 12 games worth of minutes this season (1080 minutes from 22 appearances), unfortunately. 

 

I think it's time to release him this season. 

I heard from a very good source a few days ago that if Jack plays another 3 games this season it triggers an automatic one-year extension. I heard PC isnt happy with that so dont expect to see him again unless in an emergency. 

That is great news. I assume we have Sky to thank for this as I am sure SPFL would have been pushing for 3rd April to give us less time to prepare for the OF game. Wasnt sure it would be on Sky given it is a Euro week and there is usually blackouts.

I will actually be quietly pleased if this is cancelled as it will give us more time to get players back fit and also if this goes ahead today the pitch looks likely to be a leveller making it more difficult to play our normal game. 
 

id imagine the game would be slotted in for April 10 in between the OF and Ross County. 

Our supporters bus has had to set off now to ensure if it is on we are there on time but not looking good from the Sky pictures that were just on. 

Rangers 2 Benfica 1

FGS Silva

Really proud of the team, result and performance but how much longer must we put up with the £38kpw liability that has just cost us, again, another famous result?

I can hardly believe we got a result like that with the players missing that we have. I had this tie at 40/60 before the game but now it’s probably 52/48 if we can get the place rocking despite the early ko.