my take on Walter Smith

[Zappa 0]

Walter is taking Rangers on a stroll to nowhere but hey he's Walter and he's entitled.

I won't be particularly unhappy if Walter takes us on a stroll to nowhere if there's a wee town in the middle of nowhere called Two In A Row.... :spl::spl:

[maineflyer 0]

I won't be particularly unhappy if Walter takes us on a stroll to nowhere if there's a wee town in the middle of nowhere called Two In A Row.... :spl::spl:

 

And I'll drink a toast to him if he does. However, I'm sure he's not the only one who could win an SPL title for Rangers and his real weakness is that he will leave no legacy of success when he goes. the next guy will have to start from scratch, as happened the last time.

 

Actually, I've little stomach left for criticising Walter Smith. Everyone knows his limitations and everyone knows this will be his last season. Most people are already looking beyond Smith and Murray and thinking about what might lies in store for Rangers.

[Zappa 0]

I won't be particularly unhappy if Walter takes us on a stroll to nowhere if there's a wee town in the middle of nowhere called Two In A Row.... :spl::spl:

 

And I'll drink a toast to him if he does. However, I'm sure he's not the only one who could win an SPL title for Rangers and his real weakness is that he will leave no legacy of success when he goes. the next guy will have to start from scratch, as happened the last time.

I'll discuss his legacy when he leaves, but to be perfectly honest he doesn't have a great deal of control or over it in terms of the squad since he hasn't been able to buy at all for over a year & likely won't be able to buy in January either. Some people will say thank god for that, but the same people would probably agree that Walter can't get rid of the players who aren't working because he knows he won't be allowed to spend enough to definitely improve the squad. The old chap's in a nasty situation to be fair & all this talk about him having blown �£30m on duds is a load of tripe because he hasn't spent that much at all. Come the end of the January transfer window he won't even have spent �£10m in his 3 years here since 2007.

 

Most people are already looking beyond Smith and Murray and thinking about what might lies in store for Rangers.

It's a worrying thought.

[Frankie 8,186]

Good opening post Gisabeer...

 

I certainly share your opinion on Smith's flaws but I'm also unsure it is as clear-cut as some say when they offer criticism. As I posted elsewhere, and it isn't a reason alone to keep Smith, I don't think we could find a better manager to deal with everything that is happening at the club at the moment.

 

I appreciate that sounds a bit contradictory given I agree with your criticism but football management isn't always as simple as it can be made out to be.

[biggordy 0]

Just about all the things said about Walter Smith, positive and negative, are probably true and difficult to argue with.

 

This Champs League campaign, home games only, has lacked the commitment required by the players to achieve decent results and any kind of onfield leadership was non-existent. Maybe Barry Ferguson is missed after all as I am certain he would not have let such capitulations occur. No-one has stepped up to take such responsibility.

However as someone said earlier, it is WS who is responsible for putting the Team out on the park and therefore I suppose the blame lies at his door.

 

By the way, has anyone thought that it might be the format of the CL that Smith cannot handle, that is the "league" set up where you have to try and win every game.

Go back to the UEFA run 2 years ago. All ties were home and away. How many times were we 0-0 at home only to go away and sneak a win as the other team felt almost obliged to open up and attack us.

 

Just a thought.

[bmck 117]

My thoughts on WS are completely schizophrenic. He is a great ambassador for the club and has that level of personal integrity that makes him hard to criticise. But it wasnt until I read the Everton fans assessment of him the other day there - and I didnt follow his time in Everton - that I realised that all the reservations I had about him are mirrored exactly not just in another fan, but in another fan in a completely different environment, far away from Ibrox. All that guys comments, positive and negative, were 100% what I think of WS. The 451, eight defenders on the pitch, aversion to the young, unecessary unadventurousness, and all the rest arent figments of our collective imaginations, and though to focus solely on these things, and ignore the good, would be wrong, these are managerial flaws. its not wrong to point them out.

[calscot 0]

Some of the criticisms don't quite follow though. Against Stuttgart, the formation wasn't picked as 4-5-1, he didn't have eight defenders on the pitch - he actually played quite a few forwards, and he also played two teenagers and a reasonably young team - yet to me, it was our worst CL performance this season.

 

I'm sure alternative criticisms will be used to explain this but it shows that picking a team to win a game is just not that simple.

 

Stuttgart are a very expensive German side and I'm not sure how many managers would have fared much better with our resources and geographical location.

 

We may not have done that well against the Romanian champions, but they are champions of a larger country with a good footballing heritage, and are probably the luckiest team in the CL - another own goal on Tuesday night to give them a win and a great chance of qualifying for the next round.

 

In the champions league we're the equivalent of Partick playing the SPL. We'll get some results, but be mostly beaten by bigger clubs, and while we also have our peers where sometimes we win, sometimes we don't depending on the rub of the green, finishing bottom will never be a total surprise.

 

Unless Scottish football has a golden period for producing top class players, or we get a managerial genius, I doubt we would compete any better with the choice of managers we will have to replace Walter.

[Totti 0]

The general attitude by many on here seems to be we know we're crap and Walter's a very limited manager but Celtic are even worse and that will do for now.

 

Well thats pathetic. We may as well roll over and die.

 

We need to give someone else a try and if that doesn't work try again. No, the world's elite managers won't be chomping at the bit to manage us but there's still plenty decent coaches who would and who would be capable of getting us playing half decent football at least in the SPL. In Scotland we really are playing dreadful clubs week in week out and it wouldn't take Arsene Wenger to get us beating these sides with a bit of style.

 

I could tolerate us being pish if we attempted to play half decent football and gave more youngsters a chance. With Walter the only way we're going is backwards.

[Totti 0]

Some of the criticisms don't quite follow though. Against Stuttgart, the formation wasn't picked as 4-5-1, he didn't have eight defenders on the pitch - he actually played quite a few forwards, and he also played two teenagers and a reasonably young team - yet to me, it was our worst CL performance this season.

 

I'm sure alternative criticisms will be used to explain this but it shows that picking a team to win a game is just not that simple.

 

Stuttgart are a very expensive German side and I'm not sure how many managers would have fared much better with our resources and geographical location.

 

We may not have done that well against the Romanian champions, but they are champions of a larger country with a good footballing heritage, and are probably the luckiest team in the CL - another own goal on Tuesday night to give them a win and a great chance of qualifying for the next round.

 

In the champions league we're the equivalent of Partick playing the SPL. We'll get some results, but be mostly beaten by bigger clubs, and while we also have our peers where sometimes we win, sometimes we don't depending on the rub of the green, finishing bottom will never be a total surprise.

 

Unless Scottish football has a golden period for producing top class players, or we get a managerial genius, I doubt we would compete any better with the choice of managers we will have to replace Walter.

No it wasn't 4-5-1 we started with. It was some sort of bizarre 3-4-3/5-3-2 formation with players all over the shop

[biggordy 0]

The general attitude by many on here seems to be we know we're crap and Walter's a very limited manager but Celtic are even worse and that will do for now.

 

Well thats pathetic. We may as well roll over and die.

 

We need to give someone else a try and if that doesn't work try again. No, the world's elite managers won't be chomping at the bit to manage us but there's still plenty decent coaches who would and who would be capable of getting us playing half decent football at least in the SPL. In Scotland we really are playing dreadful clubs week in week out and it wouldn't take Arsene Wenger to get us beating these sides with a bit of style.

 

I could tolerate us being pish if we attempted to play half decent football and gave more youngsters a chance. With Walter the only way we're going is backwards.

 

 

Would you tolerate us trying to play football but being beaten constantly, possibly relegated, winning no competitions and generating no money because we can't qualify for Europe.

You may tolerate it but I'll bet 99% of the support would find it rather difficult.

 

We can't keep trying different managers, that costs money. Look at THEM in the east on their manager hunt, they ended up settling for their sixth choice because nobody wants to manage them, and he's manna from heaven as far as we are concerned.

 

We,re �£30m in debt, bank is a knockin', no owner and our manager is past it.

You say feck all this as long as we TRY to play football. I only wish we could ! Get real my friend.

Maybe one day, but not for a few years yet I'm afraid.