Why THIS must never die at Ibrox
If Rangers fans are not a stranger to something, it is hard times. Quite frankly, the hell of 2012 lingers to this day, with a weak and dishevelled regime at every level of the Club now.
The deeply worrying concession of where Rangers are seems to have permeated throughout the fanbase, with frustration and helplessness when it comes to offering a solution.
Because, the truth is, we all have our hands tied behind our back and unlike the EGM of 2015, this time the fanbase is powerless to effect change.
And yet, what do we have here? Excitement? Yes. For as long as I can remember, whatever is going on at Ibrox, whether it be our club brought to the brink or a regime we do not trust, or a team that simply appears hopeless for the task at hand, we still love our club as much now as we always have.
I am as excited for Ross County on Sunday as I have been for every match Rangers have ever played.
The team is mince, the manager appears not to have a clue, and our latest signing is yet another ‘prospect for the future’ who is said to be aimed at Academy development. The board seems to have absolutely no plan to get us out of this mire, and we sit 6th in the table.
Yet we still love our Club – we still get as excited as we always did for every match, because it matters.
It matters what the XI is. It matters what the formation is. It matters how we play. It matters if we win. It matters how the defence copes.
Everything matters, and everything always will.
The most worrying day would be when it did not. We might be arguably the worst top-flight Rangers side there has ever been, and we might be going backwards from an already hideous regime built by Mark Warburton, but the day we accept where we are will be a sad, sad day.
In our heads, we do – we know by our normal standards this Rangers machine is creaky and missing a bunch of cogs. It needs a complete overhaul.
But in our hearts we still expect the moon from it. We cannot go the route of, with all due respect to the following, Leeds, Forest, Wednesday, and many others who now ‘know their place’ and find themselves permanently etched in the lower leagues of English football.
We are Rangers, and while we know in our minds how bad we are, we must always believe in our hearts that, like Huddersfield, we will rise again one day.
Right now we are essentially Glasgow Hearts, albeit with a stadium too big for purpose and we expect too much. But the day we do not expect too much the last flickering ember of what it means to be Rangers is seriously at risk of being doused.
We will never die, we will always be the people, and for as long as the supporters believe in what Rangers means, that will remain the case.
And that is why Ross County this Sunday is as exciting as any Rangers match. It will be rubbish, no doubt, and the usual suspects will play poorly and our manager will take positives from another woeful loss of points – but we remain embedded, enshrined in the values of being Rangers.
As long as we keep them, we remain us.