European minnows

[der Berliner 3,257]

Maybe other countries train longer than we do? Don't we only train for a few hours in the morning then players can go home or wherever?

 

Not from what I have experienced first hand from my local Bundesliga team. 2 hours morning session, 2 hours in the afternoon and off with their BMWs et al.

 

IMHO people simply over-react on here. They usually hardly have a clue about our training, yet lambast players and management about it. They trained well enough for 3IAR, no questions asked. They trained well enough for all our European games in the CL, no questions asked. Had they scored a couple or more without reply last night, no-one on here would raise a fitness or tactical problem issue. And no-one will raise that question if we wrap up No. 55 in May.

 

Maybe you will listen to the former Sporting Lisbon coach?

[Juancornetto 1]

Not from what I have experienced first hand from my local Bundesliga team. 2 hours morning session, 2 hours in the afternoon and off with their BMWs et al.

 

IMHO people simply over-react on here. They usually hardly have a clue about our training, yet lambast players and management about it. They trained well enough for 3IAR, no questions asked. They trained well enough for all our European games in the CL, no questions asked. Had they scored a couple or more without reply last night, no-one on here would raise a fitness or tactical problem issue. And no-one will raise that question if we wrap up No. 55 in May.

 

That's a bit of a moot point mate to be honest, if we had won and progressed you are correct nobody would mention coaching or tactics but defeats show up the problems more than successes and it wouldn't have changed the fact that the Slovenian champions only required one clear chance to score and we needed dozens.

 

Same with Malmo, were they better than us? No, but they weren't far off our level and they made their chances count and we couldn't. Lennon is experiencing the same thing with his mob as well. It's the same domestically we are wasteful with the ball and with chances maybe because we are guaranteed to get 6 or 7 good chances in a game. If we were to be restricted to 2 or 3 per game like Maribor or Malmo were every game we would soon improve the ratio.

[Gazza_8 233]

IMHO people simply over-react on here. They usually hardly have a clue about our training, yet lambast players and management about it. They trained well enough for 3IAR, no questions asked. They trained well enough for all our European games in the CL, no questions asked. Had they scored a couple or more without reply last night, no-one on here would raise a fitness or tactical problem issue. And no-one will raise that question if we wrap up No. 55 in May.

 

Training to play the SPL dross and training to play european teams is totally different and non-comparable.

[johnnyk 158]

Not from what I have experienced first hand from my local Bundesliga team. 2 hours morning session, 2 hours in the afternoon and off with their BMWs et al.

 

IMHO people simply over-react on here. They usually hardly have a clue about our training, yet lambast players and management about it. They trained well enough for 3IAR, no questions asked. They trained well enough for all our European games in the CL, no questions asked. Had they scored a couple or more without reply last night, no-one on here would raise a fitness or tactical problem issue. And no-one will raise that question if we wrap up No. 55 in May.

 

Maybe you will listen to the former Sporting Lisbon coach?

 

I disagree, watching Rangers in the last few years or more, we can't be doing much training on what I said earlier, corners, free kicks, movement when we've got the ball and when we've not got the ball, for me it's there to see and nothing has been done about it for years. Usually we can't beat the first man at corners, free kicks are hopeless 9 times out of 10, this has to be down to training? Or are you happy with our style of play, players commitment and set pieces etc? For someone to get �£10k a week and they can't beat the first man at corners 9 times out of 10 is embarrassing is it not? I enjoy winning the league and cups as we all do but most of us will say it's not been enjoyable to watch but enjoy the results of course.

 

I read about players staying back practising these at other clubs, maybe our players do it maybe they don't but they are not improving at all if they are, why not?

 

People still go on about Kaunas so even if we win the league i'm sure this exit won't be a forgotten issue anytime soon.

 

We probably should've won the 4 games we've played in Europe with our chances we've had, it's not good enough to miss so many chances in all 4 games, along with all the mistakes we made and keep making, we are not going forward as a club in Europe but are on a big decline while other nations are improving footballing wise much better than our nation is. I'm sure we will qualify for the Europa league again in the next few years but I don't know when I will see Rangers in the CL for years to come given the qualifying rounds we will need to go through and that is if we keep winning the league.

 

Saying that I will keep going and supporting them

[der Berliner 3,257]

Training to play the SPL dross and training to play european teams is totally different and non-comparable.

 

Yes, but how do you (or anyone else on here) know how we prepare or train ahead of European games? Have we got any insiders at MP or are we just clinging to third party rumours and hearsay?

[der Berliner 3,257]

Same with Malmo, were they better than us? No, but they weren't far off our level and they made their chances count and we couldn't.

 

As I said before, they were 18 weeks into their season and quality-wise not exactly amateurs either. We were just out of pre-season and surely not sharp enough. Said it before and say it again: 18 weeks means that Malm�¶ had the fitness and experience that we would have in November. Lets face up to them again in November and see how that ends.

[Gazza_8 233]

Yes, but how do you (or anyone else on here) know how we prepare or train ahead of European games? Have we got any insiders at MP or are we just clinging to third party rumours and hearsay?

 

I think you're clinging onto a false hope that our training methods are anything other than mediocre. I have no facts or insiders at MP (apart from a mate who coaches the youth team there 4 days a week) to back me up. Hold on, maybe I do have an insider!

[Gazza_8 233]

As I said before, they were 18 weeks into their season and quality-wise not exactly amateurs either.

 

How many weeks into the season were Sportfreunde Lotte when we played them?

[calscot 0]

There are so many erroneous arguments on here. I'll say again, Scottish football may well be sick and our training methods crap, but you can't use our game last night as much evidence of that or can be to point to the solutions mentioned. It just doesn't make any sense.

 

1. We played 8 non-Scots and 4 Scots stated and another came on. If the non-Scots need three touches or can't pass a ball, what has that to do with Scottish football? The worst player on the night for us was a Spaniard, the most criticised player of the season so far is American - what can cures for Scottish football do for them? As for the Scots we played, MacGregor might not have been fantastic at the goal but what has that got to do with the Scottish malaise seeing as he's a great keeper overall. Perry and Wylde were getting plaudits recently and by all accounts didn't do too badly last night. That just leaves Wallace, who is considered a reasonable signing even compared to our foreign Papac, and limped off anyway; and Broadfoot - well he is who he is and had a decent game.

 

2. Are our training methods so bad that professional players from other clubs in Scotland an all over the world suffer from them and quickly turn into worse players merely by training with us? Four players who started have only been at the club for five minutes - the training must be horrendous. The young players are vaunted one minute and so it can't be the youth coaching but two of them are ruined already by the first team coaches?

 

3. How can anyone really say Maribor displayed more skill, better fitness, better passing and technique when from where I sat, we totally dominated the game and created an incredible amount of chances compared to them? Our problem was bad finishing, desperate defending by them and general bad luck. We created enough to win a few games but didn't get the ball in the net. We had a far better scoring opportunity, for and against ratio, than Man U had against us in two games. How come when we gain a draw that way, we're technically poor, but if it's done to us, they are technically better? Make your minds up.

 

4. Booze. Which players booze so much it affects their game? And does it matter? Look at George Best, Gazza and others. Nottingham Forest won a shit load of stuff including two European Cups and they were ordered to have a drink just before each game. Then there's the team that drinks together, wins together. There is no evidence that being completely tee-total vastly improves your performance. Also are people saying that the six Scots who played in our team lost us the tie because they all drank too much?

 

All those problems may be there at Rangers and in Scotland, but it has bugger all relevance to OUR game last night and the one in Maribor.

 

In my own opinion, I thought we showed we are a better team than either of the two that put us out but we didn't do enough at the time. If these two teams played in our league, I'd be confident of finishing above them. I would NOT want to discard our manager and team and replace them with the personnel from those two clubs.

 

I would say our biggest problems were not being ready for the ties, not taking our chances, losing soft goals, losing a goal to an excellent strike, inconsistent refereeing, a couple of players' mentalities and a good dose of bad luck - during the games and including the number of injuries. Another thing we've lost is a strong mentality that we had under Smith - but Ally could get that back in time, he still has to settle into the job. Most of those problems are either down to the individual players, or out of our control.

 

The management need to take the blame of readiness and a bit of the mentality and motivation.

 

However, I don't think we can pin this one on Scottish football, Scottish coaching or Scottish culture. There may be problems there but that's another story.

[Zappa 0]

3. How can anyone really say Maribor displayed more skill, better fitness, better passing and technique when from where I sat, we totally dominated the game and created an incredible amount of chances compared to them? Our problem was bad finishing, desperate defending by them and general bad luck. We created enough to win a few games but didn't get the ball in the net. We had a far better scoring opportunity, for and against ratio, than Man U had against us in two games. How come when we gain a draw that way, we're technically poor, but if it's done to us, they are technically better? Make your minds up.

 

This third point you made says a lot of what I think about it myself.

 

I remember when we went out to Kaunas only a few months after being in the UEFA Cup final and it was as if we had never been in a European final a few months earlier. Level-headed and highly intelligent people took leave of every ounce of common sense in their body and called for Walter Smith to get given his P45. We went on to win more domestic silverware under his leadership than he could possibly carry and while we were again humbled in Europe in the 09/10 season, we then went on another reasonably good European run in his last season as manager while also winning our league and the league cup. When we won the SPL again in May people who had been previously saying Walter should get the sack after Kaunas were singing his praises like I've never seen in my lifetime. The same people who almost HATED the thought of Walter managing the team all of a sudden showed him the respect he deserved all along.

 

The moral of this wee rant is that poor or freak results either in Europe or domestically, are not the telling of a manager or the team he's infinitely building while in the job. Ally McCoist still has to prove himself as a manager because he's only just begun, but he deserves enough time to build his own squad and that will take some time because he's got some dead wood on the books that he can't get rid of this season without pay-offs which the club can no longer afford.