Tannochsidebear

I did say in Glasgow!

I recall that day well BH, sitting in the park for hours, thankfully it was a pleasant day. As you say the atmosphere generated by the home side was one of the best I have encountered. On Lyon, I also took a photo of the scoreboard at 3-0, but phone technology in 2007 wasn't what it is today and it was pretty grainy - at least I knew what it said! We had been sitting in Lyon town centre in a wee cafe in a square chatting to locals as they passed by, when my mate responds to a Lyon fans request as to a score prediction that we would win easy 3-0. We took the beer off him! Needless to say he has never let us forget it since.

Can anyone find out if this is the first sell-out in the top tier for a league game in Glasgow since 2012? I think it is!

A search of Companies House tells me that FS, but there is absolutely nothing to on the Club1872 website about this Company or to say why we need an additional layer of Structure in Club1872? Did James Blair do this on his own (he is sole Director). "One fans group -many layers" is not a slogan I was familiar with! The more I hear about Club1872 the more my spidey senses are tingling. I have been supportive of pretty much all Rangers fans groups over the years on the basis that if a bunch of fans give up a lot of their own time to try to do something for the betterment of either the fans or the club then they deserve some support, certainly initially. I am still paying £11.25pm into RST and £18.72pm into RF but I am, for the first time since RST started in 2003, starting to wonder if i should continue. I get the feeling something is not right about Club1872, I just don't know what it is, and I desperately want to be wrong.

Not wanting to take away from the message of the statement which is spot on, but who or what is Supporters Voice Ltd and why is it issuing statements in its own name when everything up till now has just been Club1872?

It say a lot when any old un-named defender is polling higher than Wilson/Kiernan/Hill. This is fast becoming our manager's achilees heel if we get to 1 September without additions to centre back. If he is happy to play this season with Wilson/Kiernan after watching them getting rag-dolled by second tier teams all year, then he is not the manager many believe him to be. I am willing to give him the time he has asked for in this market to enable him to get the right targets, but quite clearly the fact he has struggled to improve in this area other than Hill (who was surely for cover) means that both he and his recruitment team have failed (to date) in the area needing the most work.

For me our strongest is Barton Nico and Holt playing in front of them. The runs he makes in behind defenders can be picked out this season with they two quality passers behind him. I dont understand anyone pressing the negative button on any of our midfielders however. They are all decent players and while we may want some over others, I dont believe any of them are that bad that you would want to press the negative button, as in you definitely dont want them to play. Or am I misunderstanding the concept here?

I wish these pundits who are so certain we will be nowhere near winning the title had their jobs on the line if we win it. Surely their bosses would be looking at them saying WTF do you really know about football that we are paying you to write about it when you got this so badly wrong? I know if one of my employees told me that in their experience we could reasonably predict XYZ is going to happen, and it turns out to be ABC I would be asking huge questions of their suitability for the role. Are they seriously wanting us to believe that our squad, which is clearly second best in terms of players and cost in this division, with resources to strengthen further, no Europe to take our eye off things, a manager many proper pundits are impressed with, will somehow be behind a two bob outfits like Aberdeen or Hearts, who were over 15 points back from the worst celtic team ever last season and have not strengthened at all? It can only be bigotry that is making them think like this. They are lucky I am not their editor or boss.

Talk is cheap, and so is he.

The mhanks are at Tynecastle on Sunday BEFORE the league cup games, so they are not going to force them to play Hearts away then Motherwell at home 2 days later.

Anyone making plans we are certain to be playing on Tuesday 9th with the Celtic game on wed 10th, as we play Sat 6th and Celtic play Sun 7th.

I had guessed that dB, but thanks for pointing out Crooks for me, didn't know who that was, shouldn't be allowed in Directors Box in a tracksuit though! Mr Struth will be turning in his grave!

Read that again, and again, and again. Just how sad is that statement for a club of our stature and history in the game, and for football in this country as a whole. Burnley. Feckin Burnley! Are they even in the top half dozen clubs in their county, never mind anything else? So sad.

Looks like Mark Hateley to me!

At half time today on the big screens they showed some action from games past on this day, including a 6-0 whipping of Gotu from 1997 with Durie, Negri, McCoist & Albertz scoring the first 4 before they cruelly stopped the footage as apparently the teams were ready to kick off again. What would we give for any of that front three today instead of Kenny "misser" Miller? We wouldn't see too many free kicks 25 yards out being passed sideways with big Jorg in the team either! I hope this feature is here to stay with some classic action both pre-match and at half time. I wrote an article calling for exactly this about a decade ago.

But they weren't playing the Rangers then!

Went to my first friendly in about a decade today and it was a great reminder of why I stopped going. No tempo, about 15 subs, take nothing positive out of it as a spectator. If you were to take it seriously (which I don't) then our main failings from last season are still glaringly obvious. Central defence is a shambles, no midfield creativity, no lethal finisher. Hill had a mare, Miller looks even slower and his first touch even worse than even I thought possible, McKay the stand out but didn't find it as easy against good defenders, Halliday looked lost, as did Nico. No positives from the starting 11, a couple of the subs looked better but Burnley had gone home by then. As a run-out for fitness a lot of our players got a good hour, and that is about all you can take out of it. I really don't care that the pen was never a pen, the second was a couple of yards offside, and that the result went against us as pre-season is not about that. I would rather these things went wrong today and not next week.

It is very important that we have match day tickets available for sale match by match. We must be able to accomodate tourists who are drawn to visit our city and our club. If they cant get in to Ibrox they may end up elsewhere....... Most EPL clubs, especially in the big cities, have hundreds, perhaps thousands of "fans" coming once or twice a year from abroad to see the games live. If we were completely sold out we would lose this option to sell to future fans or those who have Rangers as a favourite second club. We must also take into account the fans who cannot afford a season ticket but are nevertheless just as passionate about our club and want to attend as many games as they can find the cash for. We must never alienate working class football fans just so we can get a few extra quid in August. If we can get the secondary ticketing working properly it would be very helpful to all categories of non-season ticket fans mentioned above, but IMO we should be keeping some back as a principle.

While McFarland and Warburton deserve great credit for managing the budget and improving the squad, bringing in real quality like Barton & Nico, it is also clear we have missed our first choice targets for centre half and centre forward, and perhaps our back-up choices as well, given the lack of movement in this area. It would be foolish to believe we should get everyone we target, especially given the wages players can earn at mediocre clubs in England, but given these were most certainly priority signings from last season, I am sure they are very disappointed to miss out on their first picks. Hopefully they have re-assessed their options and are close to pulling off the two more signings that will give us all the belief that we are ready.

Third place is absolute failure IMO. With the resources at his disposal, there could only be one outcome if Warburton finished third, the same as McLeish & McCall got for the same finish. It wont happen, second is the worst position we can possibly end up in. Aberdeen couldnt even push the worst tim team in history close in two goes, and Hearts have just been gubbed by Maltese minnows. Anyone thinking we will struggle to overcome these sides over 38 games is in denial of the blindingly obvious.. I would go so far as to say I think that we will be at least 15 points clear of third place.

The statement by Club1872 could have been written by the club itself. Instead of insisting that the club change its policy to one where you are innocent until convicted, which some have been advocating for many years and that in a democratic society is a right, we have Club1872 accepting this draconian position and somehow trying to defend David Martin's position of guilty until proven innocent IF the police have arrested you for something, (note not charged or convicted). As an ex-copper he clearly believes that they never make mistakes, and sometimes seems to forget that working for the club means working FOR the fans, not against them. Club 1872 should be pushing with everything it has got to change this ridiculous policy at the club which goes all the way back to Herr Hood and David Murray who were hated for their treatment of fans, instead of acting as a mouthpiece for the club defending its undefendable position. The club would have been absolutely spot on to say once the criminal investigations by the police have ended, if anyone is convicted of an offence, we will take action against them. Nobody wants those who have let the club down by fighting on the pitch to be given a free pass, but where there is a legal investigation ongoing, the Club is absolutely totally wrong to convict our fans prior to them having their case heard in court, and our fans reps should know it.

Another well written and produced article from John. It is interesting that while we come to the same conclusion (I believe we will win the title and have put my money where my mouth is), I disagreed with his assessments of many of the players he discusses, with the exception of McKay who I think he gets spot on. Thats what makes it such an interesting story for us this season, as we dont really know what yet what the manager believes will be his strongest 11, if he will rotate the squad more than he did last year other than just with subs, who we may get in on loan at the end of August when teams look to offload their bright young stars to get experience, what striker/defender we will bring in before the window closes, and who out of the new players will maintain a good level of form and who may be disappointing or not fit in. All that is before we find out if he will change the shape for the tougher away games, and if he will change the shape to either push for a winner or close out a slender lead, basically if he has learned from the mistakes of last season (not that there were many). As with players, we want the manager, still relatively inexperienced, to progress and develop as well. We simply must hit the ground running, and win our first 4 games to go into the first OF game with at least a 3 point lead due to their ridiculous situation of cancelling a league game to play a friendly. If we do that the likelihood is that we will be more than 3 points ahead as the bheasts have a tough opening 3 games before we go to the San Giro, and all the pressure will be on them, more so after the SCSF, and if they havent made the CL groups they will be under pressure from that as well. All very interesting and it is great to be looking forward to a season with such anticipation and positivity.

It was interesting to see that the two pundits who are bears (Jackson & Dalziel) didnt choose McKay for their OF 11. It makes them look more stupid than usual. McKay and Griffiths are the two that should be in all selections, the rest can be argued, although I am struggling to think of another bheast I would select other than Gordon and perhaps Roberts for the other wing from Barrie. I am sure they must have better centre halfs than our two from last season but other than Efe I dont any of them well enough!

Nope you're wrong, he actually IS that stupid! It is quite well known that Joe is as thick as two short planks, as folk used to say!

What a load of dross. How some folk are falling for this nonsense is incredible. We laugh at the tims putting stories in the papers aabout how they are going for this star and that star for £XM and £xx pw wages only for them to just miss out and eventually sign another nobody for a fraction of the dough previously mentioned. Our board and signing policy to date gives absolutely no credibility to a signing of this nature. I know it is the silly season, but that is beyond silly.