Lifted from �£�£ , but agree with just about all of it

[calscot 0]

Calscot sorry mate but all i can do if laugh. You just want hear a bad word against smith no matter what will you?

 

I'm all for bad words when they are valid - I haven't seen many that are. Smith is treated incredibly disrespectfully on here and I'll bet you pretty much nobody, apart from the odd guy wanting a name for himself, would give the same criticism to his face.

 

I LOVED it when we secured Le Guen as manager, but I said a lot of bad stuff about him myself - however, it was all valid and I'd repeat it to his face. Imagine that instead of Walter, we had Le Guen for the last 4 years and everything else was the same. Do you think I'd be criticising him? Do you think it's somehow personal?

 

I just find it strange and wrong when highly successful people are criticised without validity - that applies to everyone, not just Walter Smith.

 

I can see why people don't think Smith's teams are aesthetic but they get the job done. Jim Furyk has an ugly golf swing, but does that really matter when he wins a competition? Graeme Obree was constantly driven out of his sport due to aesthetics; do you think that's fair?

 

At worst, Walter has an unconventional way of getting great results with a small squad of ordinary players. You might not like his style, but as he keeps getting the results, does it really make him so worthy of bad words?

[Gazza_8 233]

When a team is constantly punching above its weight - what criticism is fair and where is the room for improvement?

 

Struggling to beat Killie at home is punching above our weight?

 

C'mon!!!

[calscot 0]

You can't argue with the trophies he's won for us, particularly at a time when we've been down-sizing massively in terms of fees and wages. But is it wrong to ask if another manager could get more out of the players we have or get them playing more attractive football?

 

I only say that because we are still the second-biggest spenders in the SPL yet over the last few years have struggled to beat teams who spend significantly less than us.

 

It's a fair question, but the answer is who? I can't think of anyone. Period. How about the best young manager in Europe? Gordon Strachan? Craig Burley? Tony Mowbray? Eck? Craig Brown?

 

The second part is just plain wrong. We're the second biggest spenders and since Walter took over, we've been the best team in the league every year, bar the time we were forced to play about 6 games in 12 days. A game of football is played by two teams and just because one spends more than the other doesn't mean it will be a walkover.

 

The disparity in spending between Man U and Rangers is far greater than between Rangers and any other SPL team. Yet they struggled to beat us. Does that make Alex Ferguson a shit manager?

 

We struggled worse under Dick Advocaat with a much greater disparity of riches. The difference now is much less as we can no longer afford superstars - yet we keep on winning titles - or being narrowly second, and are always miles ahead of the rest of the pack.

 

A league is not about individual games - it's about where you finish at the end of the season that counts. We're miles ahead of the rest of the league.

[calscot 0]

Struggling to beat Killie at home is punching above our weight?

 

C'mon!!!

 

From the reports I read, we didn't "struggle" at all - they hardly even had a shot on goal and their penalty was a very dodgy decision. They are also one of the best teams in the league right now - why does everyone think every game should be a walkover? Very few teams do that.

 

I really don't get this type of thinking where we're shite if we don't win every game 10-0.

[calscot 0]

PS In what other country (or universe) is a win against the 4th placed side to move a club within 2pts of the league with a game in hand, considered rubbish?

 

Am I really mad because I don't think that way? If that's the case then I'm glad I'm mad - your world looks a lot more miserable than mine from here...

[craig 5,199]

Struggling to beat Killie at home is punching above our weight?

 

C'mon!!!

 

Winning back to back titles, getting to a UEFA final and being in almost every domestic final since he returned, whilst his biggest rivals have consistently outspent him considerably, IS punching above our weight.

 

All of this with the backdrop of having to SIGNIFICANTLY reduce the size of the playing squad and, due to finances, also reducing it in terms of quality.

 

I would say YES, we have been punching above our weight.

[CumbernauldGers 0]

PS In what other country (or universe) is a win against the 4th placed side to move a club within 2pts of the league with a game in hand, considered rubbish?

Am I really mad because I don't think that way? If that's the case then I'm glad I'm mad - your world looks a lot more miserable than mine from here...

 

Mate are you for real???

 

You must be having a laugh.

 

This is not the EPL where it was say Man U just beating Man City or Chelsea, it was Rangers v Killie, a team that have not spent a penny for decades.

 

I think your post sums up a huge section of the Rangers support now a days. You are just ready to accet anything as long as it comes from a legend of the club.

[CumbernauldGers 0]

Winning back to back titles, getting to a UEFA final and being in almost every domestic final since he returned, whilst his biggest rivals have consistently outspent him considerably, IS punching above our weight.

 

All of this with the backdrop of having to SIGNIFICANTLY reduce the size of the playing squad and, due to finances, also reducing it in terms of quality.

 

I would say YES, we have been punching above our weight.

 

Everthing you say is trau and makes sense, but the problem is that we play in the spl and our budget is some much higher that everybody else other than celtic that you cant use the size of the squad as someway of proving a great job he is doing as we have a massize budget come#pared to the rest.

[rbr 1,247]

Mate are you for real???

 

You must be having a laugh.

 

This is not the EPL where it was say Man U just beating Man City or Chelsea, it was Rangers v Killie, a team that have not spent a penny for decades.

 

I think your post sums up a huge section of the Rangers support now a days. You are just ready to accet anything as long as it comes from a legend of the club.

 

No your bang on it's Scotland where we get about �£2million from tv compared to the last place EPL team who gets over �£45 million before a ball is kicked , where the vast majority of the teams are in debt over �£100 million and rising and yet they still spend with impunity , Walter Smith has had money to spend but compared to the VAST majotity of teams who we play in Europe its peanuts , sometimes you dont miss something till it's gone .

 

I cannot believe the critiscism when we aren't even on the same playing fiels as the majority of european teams , especially at this stage we are at right now , yet a team with an ever reducinig squad is meant to not only compete but do it with some style and entertain as well as win , christ you dont want much

[calscot 0]

Mate are you for real???

 

You must be having a laugh.

 

This is not the EPL where it was say Man U just beating Man City or Chelsea, it was Rangers v Killie, a team that have not spent a penny for decades.

 

I think your post sums up a huge section of the Rangers support now a days. You are just ready to accet anything as long as it comes from a legend of the club.

 

Already pointed out that Man U have far more money than us and yet struggled to beat us far more than we struggled against Killie.

 

There are plenty of correlations in other countries.

 

Get this, a team that costs five times more than another, is not necessarily five times better. It doesn't work that way. If you were paying for a tour de France cycling team, a cyclist who cost five times as much as another will DEFINITELY not be five times faster and the more expensive one may struggle to beat the lesser in every stage. The yellow jersey does not win every stage - and would struggle to do so and it is possible he wins none of them, but he does win the whole race.

 

If it was a matter of the most expensive team always winning and if the difference was great, it was always a walkover, football would be the most boring sport in the world and in fact not really a sport at all. There would also have been no point in us turning up to ANY game in Europe this year. EVERY team we've played have had more resources than us. However, we've done ok as they've ALL struggled to beat us, with only Valencia getting a "clean" win.

 

You really can't have it both ways and I still think you are forgetting, we won and had by far the better of the game.