T-1000

Forlanssister, I agree with you on this but the fact we have been able to obtain this draw down facility does mean that in their (Close) opinion we are a reasonable credit risk. if, however, we had been unable to obtain a credit facility that would be seen as a negative signal particularly if the club is considering making a share issue.

Agreed, but will McKay want to stay there with Warburton gone.

I suspect Krancjar was started because Murty was hoping he would get on the ball, make a telling pass and add creativity. This didn't really happen, but looking at our bench there did not appear to be any replacements who could fulfil this role although someone like Barjonas might have added more energy but not until the end did we seem to be lacking in this department.

Monk would be an interesting choice but I rather suspect he will be looking to manage another side in the championship. A less mainstream candidate, with an eclectic background, though he is relatively inexperienced would be Nathan Jones of Luton.

So, Murty rejects the offer of being manager. The Board appear to have no viable alternative as manager otherwise such person would have been appointed. Rangers are then managerless and are slaughtered in the press and on media for not appointing a manager. They then have to make an appointment to prevent this and thus end up appointing someone on the hoof and who long term they did not originally consider as being good enough. The decision with Murty is a holding position; if he does well fine; if he does not then it gives the Board more time to look for longer term prospects. This is done in the context that the Board probably believe the title is beyond us this year because the team simply is not good enough but they want to qualify for Europe which they consider is achieaveable with Murty.

As an aside, listening to the BT commentary on the game I thought Kevin Thomson made a number of insightful points on the way Rangers were playing and I can see why Craig believes he would be a worthy addition to the coaching team.

You made a bold statement about our scouting system and the expertise of the individuals involved which I can only assume is because you have worked with the said individuals and have inside knowledge of their attributes, strengths and weaknesses; is this correct?

You made a bold statement about our scouting system and the expertise of the individuals involved which I can only assume is because you have worked with the said individuals and have inside knowledge of their attributes, strengths and weaknesses; is this correct?

Pena is a sub because we have few other options as can be seen from the fact that we also have the young player (presumably the pick of the young players) Barjonas as a sub. In respect of the comment re foreign players he plays Candeias and Morelos.

In his interview Murty seemed to hint that he wanted Alves to be available for the forthcoming games especially the one against Celtic and therefore did not want to risk him aggravating his injury.

Would you this be the Pena who cannot control the ball on a grass pitch far less a synthetic one or the Kranjcar who has no pace and is not suited to a physical encounter. Herrera up front might have been an option rather that Windass who had a poor game though this is difficult to call since the former has had limited game time and latter has been in good form. What today shows is the limitation of options available to our manager when Wallace, Dorrans, Jack and Alves are not available.

We have seen on this forum that there is little agreement about who would be a suitable candidate for manager; there appears to few options and even fewer who tick all the boxes. Perhaps, this is also the view of the board who have taken the safety first option by appointing Murty till the end of the season. By that time it will be clear if Murty has it in terms of managerial ability and if not then the Board will then have to consider what managerial candidates are available in the Summer. We know the last two appointments have been disappointing and therefore it is only to be expected that the Board will exercise some caution in appointing a manager and therefore have opted for what might called a holding opinion.

i would like to see us play someone with pace on the wing against Whittaker who I thought on Sunday looked slow and a weak link. Agree with packing midfield as Hibs are quite strong there and Martin Boyle also looks a threat.

Maybe the statement reflects a bit of payback or irritation. DM has had about 5 weeks to say he was not interested in the job. He did not do so and therefore it would be a reasonable assumption of the Rangers board that this implied he would be interested in the job. Subsequently, without holding discussions with the Rangers board he states he wants to stay with Aberdeen. The Rangers board may think that he should have weighed up the possibility of going to Rangers a number of weeks ago and made it clear then he was not interested in the post rather than waiting until after Rangers had approached Aberdeen for permission to speak to him.

Add in Not appointed when Warburton left. Seen the appointment of Pedro (rather than him) who was an unknown and had limited success. If he comes third in the league with Aberdeen he is a success. If he comes second in the league with Rangers he is a failure. Seems to have a supportive chairman. May have doubts about our board, especially since they waited 6 weeks to make an approach. Possibly enough there to give him food for thought about the desirability of a move.

Rangers 2 Aberdeen 1 FGS: Miller

I think the Board have a difficult task. They probably know that a manager like McInnes (and others) is (are) available and whilst there may be a belief he would improve the team there is probably doubt that he would be smart enough to have us competing with Rogers and Celtic. As Les186 notes we need a messiah.

Perhaps Ryan jack as he has some experience with Aberdeen though he is a touch volatile.

As we have seen with Motherwell.

r_s, name your choice of captain.

With Wallace, Dorrans and Alves out I think Murty might well bring in Miller to provide some leadership on the pitch. There are no other obvious candidates for this role and with Murty not knowing the new players that well he may inclined to play safe and include Miller if he considers him fit. Could he possibly be captain?

Pedro seems to lack a certain amount of subtlety and has insufficient insight. As examples, the treatment of Kiernan and Forrester seemed unnecessary. They may not be suitable players for Rangers but why make such an issue with them. Then MOH is sent to St.Johnstone and last might we had a bench which included Nemane. Again MOH may not be of a high enough standard for Rangers but would he not have been better as a sub last night than Nemane. Then we have the Miller debacle followed by Wallace apparently being told to stay away from the Kilmarnock game. He has picked arguments with players and officials; why involve himself with Brown and Robinson. Then we have the press conferences where he says too thus giving the media the opportunity to have a go at him. All of this suggests that his appointment was, unfortunately, a mistake.

Agree with this. In addition, Morelos was also a bit of an unknown quantity at the start of the season. Teams now know more about him and are marking him more closely and being more physical with him. It would be interesting to see what would be the result of playing another striker closer to him.

The media is aware that Pedro splits the support in terms of whether he is the right manager and they are also aware that Miller seems to have the 'respect' of former players. It looks as though the Record is using Miller to put the boot into Pedro and further undermine his position. In other words, they are revelling in shit stirring as I assume the commentators for tonight's match will also do; we should not give them that satisfaction.

You are right that it is serious money for our league but in terms of comparison with Celtic who we wish to challenge it is a relatively small amount given the number of players we have brought in. Taking as an example, we spent most of the total on Pena - 2/3 million. Compared to the amounts that are being touted for Tierney or Dembele it is relatively small. As things stand I cannot see us outspending Celtic to catch up. This makes it difficult for us to challenge for first spot in the league. The way forward for Pedro must be to buy young cheaper players with potential, bring though some from our youth system (like McCrorie) and try to improve the players we have at our disposal. I thought yesterday, Celtic players were better at finding space, had better movement and had more pace in their attacks. As we have seen this season at times we are too ponderous in attack but this is something that might improve as the players gel, the overseas players adapt to the pace and physicality of the Scottish game and we have a settled team.