A ‘free pass’ at Ibrox

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A ‘free pass’ at Ibrox

One of the biggest debating points when a team appoints a new manager, or is on the verge of doing so, is how long to give the new man before forming genuine opinions about their chances of success.

When Rangers appointed Mark Warburton, we were all extremely happy and appeared justified in that with his first two months in charge. It was not till he got tactically out-thought by both Dumbarton then destroyed by St Johnstone inside four days that the doubts crept in.

When his successor was named as Pedro Caixinha, many fans knew it was the wrong man from the start. And while his debut v Hamilton went well enough, it became apparent even during his second match (that dismal draw at home to then-bottom feeding Motherwell) that those doubts were well-founded.

Now we have a new man coming in again, but the rules may be changing on this occasion. It appears it will be Aberdeen’s Derek McInnes, albeit that is not 100% sorted yet, but regardless, it is extremely likely to be someone familiar with the SPL, and familiar with the Ibrox expectations pre-2012, and similarly with those of the new era in Govan. McInnes does tick those boxes, but we will see if he is indeed appointed.

However, for the first time, Ibrox Noise would like to propose a genuine ‘free pass’ for the new manager – in short, he will be inheriting a pretty fragmented empire, with a glut of unsuited players, a glut of out of form ones, and very few who seem good enough for the direction Rangers want to go.

He will also have two months with these guys, and, free agents aside, unable to change any of the personnel. Hence, we feel it appropriate not to form substantial opinions until March at the earliest.

While we all want success yesterday, we have wasted so much time with half a decade of incorrect managers that a few more months to give (hopefully) the right one a real chance to take proper stock of the situation and formulate a plan to get us going in the right direction seems a rational approach.

If he has a patchy start, naturally as fans we will be disappointed, but we will give the man breathing room till he has a few of his own men after January. He will then, in the weeks that follow, deserve some judgement.

We will still be gutted at a draw, and a bad performance, and we will still call that, but we will support the ideas and the philosophies up till the guy has his own soldiers.

Now, there is a caveat here – it really must be the right or most sensible appointment. The likes of McInnes, Wright, O’Neill etc fall into that category. And it must be obvious that time is needed. If we appoint another left field manager then it is curtains for this board.

But the right man, and we sure as hell hope the board have identified him, will deserve our support, and will get it.

But once he has impressed his ideas and players and it is not working at that point? Sure, we will start to judge.

It may be the new guy manages to get more out the squad and manages to get results and performances we never knew were there. That would be great and would justify everything. We hope this is the case. We would love an overnight fix.

But if not, that ‘free pass’ comes into play – and until we are deep into Spring, and he has brought in a few of his own players, we will not make judgements about the man’s suitability for the role.

Many might ask ‘why did Pedro not get this’. The reason is we knew he was the wrong man, most fans did. And he did nothing through his caravans, Vegas and barking dogs to persuade us we were wrong.

Hopefully the new man is the right man and we can all move forward at last.

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18 COMMENTS

  1. The second best team in Scotland….. had a worse defeat at home to the ambulance chasers at home, a team that got beat off Bayerns reserve team and drew at home to Killie like we did, but we were a shambles, so l for one will pray that it is not McInnes that takes the hotseat, we will not improve under him

  2. We're such a bad team with really bed players, yet we're only six points of the Mick's scoring one goal fewer. That's with some very strange ref decisions. What happens when these decisions even up and maybe a couple of our new dumplings settle and perform a bit better.

  3. That Bayern reserve team as you call it would have put 5 past us with ease. Until we accept that they are a great team and work hard towards catching them we will go nowhere. The fact that we could not even take a point off them at home tells you all you need to know about then. So instead of cheap shots let's open our eyes to how far behind our football is tho there's at the moment and let get together and catch the bastards. WATP

    • Yes. Some of the comment here on Celtic is delusional. Rangers won't be rebuilt without facing unpalatable facts. One of which is that, as of now, they are a long way behind Celtic.

  4. Sensibly mature (if unexpected) expectation-management from IN! A good run in the Scottish Cup is the only realistic target for the new manager and March is when we will start to see if he is making a difference

  5. McInnes never laid a glove on Celtic even before Rodgers. They have been second in a league without Rangers, Hibs and Hearts at various times over the last four years. I know we cannot afford another managerial mistake but I will be underwhelmed if McInnes gets the job. We cannot rule out good foreign managers just because we got it seriously wrong with Pedro. If Graham Murty wants the job till the end of the season give it to him, the players like him and seem to want to work for him. I think he is safer than McInnes.

    • Agreed – unless or until he screws up, let's stick with Murty until the end of the season. New players will not just be down to the manager anyway, that's what we have a Director of Football for WATP

  6. Whoever gets the job should get full backing from all genuine fans. We all have our own opinions about who should get the job, but we must recognise that this is a genuine chance to improve the fortunes of the team in short and long term.

    I'm a vocal critic of this board, and genuinely believe they are blocking the outside investment club needs. But they must be given a chance to get this right and prove they can move club forward. Another failure and they have to go.

    Off field the long, long, long overdue revamp of scouting is a highly positive move. To operate without a proper scouting network is crazy and the route cause of so many bad transfer decisions.

    Let's hope this is the turning point.

    Ps please stop signing sectarian/bigoted/racist songs – have a bit more imagination and sing songs that don't damage and shame the club.

    This is 2017 not 1917.

  7. I totally agree with you.
    I also think the media are picking our next leader as well as some pundits.
    And it all points to mcinnes.

  8. I agree totally. We should give the new manager time as he will be working with the previous managers squad. In fact, wasn't that the case with Pedro yet opinions were formed and expressed right away?? ��

  9. Appointing McInnes will be watching another train wreck at 1.5 million going to happen, l have lost every bit of faith in the board and need to accept and stand down, enough is enough

    • I think if we do get McInnes then let him run the team his way just like he is doing at Aberdeen let him steady us and learn us not to expect nothing more than second place and may be a cup or two,we need plenty of money to bulldozer Selltic and sadly we have not got that type of money just now we must walk before we can run but by sacking all the managers no one worth any good is going come here they may sign on for 3/4 years but know they will be sacked in first year but filled there bank account with plenty…

  10. Until our club get fit financially we will always be chasing,we could get a world class manager who may make a bit off difference,but we cannot complete with that mob financially and the fans will not accept that,no matter who the manager is,no serious investment no success, sadly.

  11. The way we are going through managers no one will want the job,Top managers cost money some thing like starting at 4 million a year,we are looking at 1 million a year i heard that Pedro was 800.000 a year the one before him 600.000 and the one before them 1 million a year so you see its cheap managers we buy and old and cheap players that is how it is for now we must sit tight for now it will get better but not by sacking our managers in there first year in charge it takes time and plenty of money to get to the top.

  12. The job is not as big as you might think. The new man needs to get a team together who can dominate the games against all the SPL teams so the league boils down to 4 cup finals versus Celtic to determine the champs. This is essentially what happened in some of the 90's years despite huge financial gulf between the teams…

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