Rangers To Honour Sandy Jardine by re-naming the Govan Stand in his honour.

[BrahimHemdani 1]

I agree that a club like ours is going to have multiple legends worthy of a stand being named and there isn't enough stands. We now have Struth and Jardine. As others have said Cooper could have had the same and Greig, McCoist and Walter Smith are certainly going to be legends forever.

 

For me a statue should have been built outside the ground.

 

EDIT:

I would rather the corners or areas outside the stadium be named as 'The John Greig Corner' or 'The Sandy Jardine Corner' etc. There you could have the Statue of the man. Over time we will run out of corners but then statues can still be put somewhere outside the stadium for those who eventually get them built.

 

I don't agree with a "John Greig Corner", he deserves more. If Struth is our greatest manager, then Greig is our greatest player; both deserve the same honour. Greig already has a statue and as a meeeting place it is commonly referred to as THE JOHN GREIG. Since there are only four corners, "Over time (we would indeed) run out" of them but "Corners" just doesn't sound right to me.

 

Who deserves a statue? Not an easy question to answer.

 

I found this in an online essay "To deserve a monument or a statue, a person should accomplish something really outstanding and significant for the city, the country, or the whole world."

 

In a footballing sense one might substitute "Club" for "City" especially one such as ours divided by football ; and few, if any, would deserve a worldwide accolade.

 

Speaking to the press on 9 May 2014, Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho claimed Frank Lampard deserves a statue outside Stamford Bridge.

 

There is a UK list here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_association_football_statues

 

Sir Matt Busby and Sir Alex Ferguson, George Best, Denis Law, Bobby Charlton, Billy Bremner, Bob Shankly, Jock Stein, Jim Baxter....................

 

Again, I don't think it would be disrespectful to say that Sandy Jardine, does not come into quite the same category. But who else in Rangers history would deserve such an honour? Frankly it would be hard to argue against our record goalscorer being being high up any such list.

 

But statutes or not, I still say that John Greig and Willie Waddell are on a different level. What more fitting tribute than the (John) Greig End and the (Willie) Waddell End.

 

The Rangers Hall of Fame criteria http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rangers_F.C._Hall_of_Fame also is relevant in this respect, though it doesn' specifically refer to of off field activities it includes "Service to the club". It should also be noted that Jardine was one of the judges. In terms of an Avenue of Statues on Edmiston Drive, let's say in terms of appearances for example: there are 11 men with 500+ appearances for the Club (and it IS noteworthy that Jardine is second only to JG in that respect and the only other man over 600). Two of the early names in particular stand out on that list: Sandy Archibald and David Meiklejohn.

 

I feel an article coming on.

[Frankie 8,104]

Many people are making several interesting points.

 

I'm comfortable enough with the decision and I think it was perhaps an easy option for the board by way of memorial for a legend that was, more than most, a focal point during the last few years.

[Gribz 743]

I don't agree with a "John Greig Corner", he deserves more. If Struth is our greatest manager, then Greig is our greatest player; both deserve the same honour. Greig already has a statue and as a meeeting place it is commonly referred to as THE JOHN GREIG. Since there are only four corners, "Over time (we would indeed) run out" of them but "Corners" just doesn't sound right to me.

 

It was just a suggestion but in no means make it a simple 'corner' as such, make a bit more around it.

 

I certainly am in favour of statues more than stand naming though.

[Frankie 8,104]

This debate is exactly the reason we should have a proper museum - so we can remember all our legends and history equally and on a regular, informative basis.

 

How much did we spend on Edmiston House and director bonuses again...?

[Chibmark 15]

Missed this fred

Edited July 17, 2014 by Chibmark

[Juancornetto 1]

Some good points made about an emotive subject here. For what it's worth I feel a bit uneasy about it. One of the things I've enjoyed about Rangers (although I fear a new era has been ushered in) is that we don't rush to make gushing tributes and token gestures about our fallen heroes, that we simply absorb them into our history.

 

Sandy Jardine will always be remembered for what he did for us on and off the pitch, I don't need to take my seat in a stand bearing his name to experience that.

[Tannochsidebear 2,304]

I must admit that I think this is a foolish idea. I first heard about this decision a couple of weeks before Sandy died, and I thought it was wrong then, and remains wrong now. The board knew Sandy had very little time left and wanted to announce it and do it towards the end of the season but with all the off-field stuff it was thought that it would be seen as a distraction or a PR stunt and therefore waited to do it in the new season.

 

While Jardine really stepped up to the plate since we were placed into administration, and worked tirelessly (with McCoist) through that period fighting everyone to keep our club safe, his many years as a club employee (non-playing) were not seen as being very successful by those who knew about the work being done in this area by him. I dont want to go into this in great detail for obvious reasons, so I will leave it at that.

 

Naming a stand in his honour is wrong. I could understand doing it for Bill Struth, who is the real Greatest Ever Ranger by a country mile in my book. I could understand honouring our Gallant Pioneers in a similar fashion, but there are just too many great players who have given good service over our history to start naming stands after them. Is Jardine deserving of this over Waddell, Greig, McPhail to name only three? Not in my book but I am sure a few others will disagree.

 

I have often advocated the idea of naming our sections with the stadium after our great players. So instead of BF1 you have the Jardine section. Replicate that for other great players and you have plenty of sections within the stadium available for naming purposes. It should only be for those Hall of Fame recipients who were truly the best of the best. In my view, the HoF has been bastardised into a commercial event with many players being inducted in recent years that simply were not good enough to belong in there. I would be keeping the naming of stands for commercial gain on 5 year contracts, the Vodafone Govan stand for example. Nobody would bother about that and it would give the club some much-needed revenue.

 

Anyway, strayed a bit OT there but they are all related (sort-of!). Back to work now!

[compo 6,043]

its the cheapest option if we had the money we could put up some statues of past greats like the other mob have done

[BrahimHemdani 1]

How much is a statue? Roughly even?

 

Interesting that one name hasn't come up as far as I can see and that is James Scotland (Scot) Symon, mainly a reserve player for 9 seasons but as Manager for 13 seasons won "six League championships, five Scottish Cups, and four League Cups. He also took Rangers into European football for the first time, guiding the team to two unfortunately losing Cup Winners Cup finals in 1961 and 1967." Of course his record doesn't stand comparison with Bill Struth but he's up there nonetheless IMHO, might be on the list for a statue. An absolute gentleman in the Struth mould, I met him a few times when he was General Manager of Partick Thistle.

 

Remind me to tell you about the night I got locked in Firhill, think I'll keep that for the dinner.............................

[Frankie 8,104]

Statue could cost anything around and above £50,000.