No Need For A Rant This Week

[Gribz 743]

Winning is everything in football, its what matters. However, when you pay money and watch Rangers (be that via going to games, via TV, via internet etc) you deserve to be entertained. You expect the players representing Rangers to be able to complete the basics of football with no or little effort. You expect your manager and coaching staff to have the team set up in way where all players are playing in their natural positions.

 

You expect the players to be able to retain the ball, you epect them to be able to deliver a corner (or set-piece) without hitting the first defender (or sailing harmlessly past the back post). You have to wonder what we do at Murray Park all day, every day. Going with what we witness on the pitch, it appears we do NOTHING constructive at training.

 

 

This is the main point. Once you have players doing the basics right then football is an easy game and better play will come naturally. I also think we do have a decent squad but the level of consistancy have been rock bottom, but thats what you get when changing the team so often with players playing well out of position. Who invented Lee McCulloch anywhere other than a left sided attacker or a striker? Since moving away from that positions he has been awful. How many foul throws did Kirk Broadfoot do last season??

 

I think our players have a bit of talent but are still being taught the Scottish style of play which ignores playing actual football. People think someone giving 200% with grit is enough to show his all and love for playing in the shirt. IMO you need 1 or 2 players like that in your team to win the ball then the rest must be able to get the ball down and play.

[calscot 0]

You pay local rates for where you live. A Romanian beer costs about 50p over there, bring that same beer to a pub in the UK and you'll probably be charged around 3 quid. Same goes for their players. We could buy up the whole Unirea team and bring them here but does anyone think we can pay them the same wages?

 

Our wage bill would end up being pretty much the same as it is now. And does anyone really think we'd have a better team? From what I seen in the two games, the only thing that Unirea have more than us is a bit of luck. Apart from that we were similar standard to them at Ibrox, and then we outplayed them on their own patch and should have won.

 

It's easy to slag our team off over a couple of games against a cheaper team who are champions of a larger but poorer country. But just where will that team be in a few years time? Will they be contesting the UEFA cup final? Or will they fade back into obscurity.

 

Many richer clubs than us will be wondering how we took such a cheap team compared to theirs to the UEFA final - does that mean they should have bought up our team and manager?

 

I really don't think it works that way.

 

It's time to see the current football world as it is instead of arrogantly thinking we should be guaranteed to be in the top 8 or 16 clubs in Europe for no real reason.

 

I also want to repeat that Rangers have RARELY been a great team in Europe, in the current circumstances there's nothing wrong with hoping we do well in the CL, but wanting to sack the team and manager when we don't - especially with the poor luck we've had (that even some Celtic fans will admit to), to me is a bit over the score.

 

Kaunus was a terrible result, this year bad luck has left us a 3 or 4 points below where we probably would realistically expect to be.

 

Talking about buying up Romanian players at tuppence a week, is not a viable proposition to move us up a level in my opinion.

 

You'd think the likes of a former CL winner who currently plays for Portugal and who has plenty of EPL experience would be a better bet, but who would be a football manager?

[CammyF 6,824]

You're still not getting my main point, those romanian players who have been assembled for pee-nuts and are paid peenuts in comparrison to Rangers players have been gelled together as a team, have the basic skills required to participate and actually thrive on the European stage. They have also been coached properly and have a style / system that plays to their strengths and exposes other teams weaknesses. On the other hand, we have none of the above.

 

Craig makes another excellent point that has been overlooked slightly in this topic. Many Rangers fans are at the end of their tether and have either given up, or are thinking of giving up. If this isn't seen as a major issue, then we are deluding ourselves.

 

As many of you will know, I travel all over watching Rangers and have done for over 25 years. Hence, you get to know the usual faces, most who have been there over the years and who I would class as the 'hardcore' or the lifeblood of the club. It is these fans who are making noises about not going any more. These are the fans who turn up in the remotest parts of Europe and cheer on the Rangers. These are the fans who are turning their back on the team thanks to the state of the club (from top to bottom).

 

As an example, there have been tickets on sale (and plenty of them) at every Rangers away game this season, including places like Tynecastle, Pittodrie (appartenly) and Tannidice. Pittodrie is the only away game I haven't been to this season but I was being offered tickets right up until the morning of the game. Something that would never have happened even a few short years ago.

 

2 CL points with one game remaining (another heavy defeat on the cards) and struggling to outrun the SPL pack, including the worst Celtc team in a decade isn't anything to shout about, it is an embarressment. WS must take his share of the blame and responsibility for this shambles.

 

It is my opinion that another coach could get so much more out of the players currently at Ibrox.

 

Cammy F