Have Rangers’ board made a big mistake?
We at Ibrox Noise (and in truth, a huge portion of the fanbase) were against the appointment of Graeme Murty.
We never shied away from it, albeit neither did we want Derek McInnes. But after the pursuit of the Aberdeen boss finally came to an end, the board shambolically gave the youth coach the job permanently.
It was a decision we were utterly opposed to, not in dislike of the man nor anything against him, but purely because we felt we needed an experienced man at the helm.
We needed someone with managerial clout, someone the players would respect and play for, and we didn’t think Murty stacked up to that.
However, when Rangers started to build a run under his permanent appointment, we bought into the idea we might have been wrong.
Only seven days ago we were looking forward to tomorrow’s Old Firm clash with real hope, even if we recognised our lack of experience in winning those clashes was an issue. It turned out to be the case, and we expressed some worries about yesterday’s visit of Killie. Which turned out well founded too.
Fast forward to now – the landscape has changed dramatically over the course of a week, and Rangers’ manager has been undone rather easily by two managers in a row, and on our own patch.
If we overlooked the terrible comments the man has made in the press since being caretaker (his comments post-match yesterday were also pure desperation) we were happy to praise he and Jimmy Nicholl’s fine spell in charge overall – and suggest we got it wrong.
But the wimpering, simpering and frankly feeble successive home losses in a week have brought absolutely everyone crashing back to earth.
The board didn’t really take a gamble on Murty, they took the easy option. And for a couple of months, it looked like they had fluked on a gem.
It felt good, really good, to believe we were on the right path, and things had indeed been rather good of late, but Murty’s chronic inexperience at this level is starting to be exposed and while there is nothing wrong with putting a first time manager in charge, it is always a risk. In Celtic’s case it’s one which paid off with Neil Lennon, in Rangers’ case Ally McCoist and now Graeme Murty cannot be classed as successes.
This is not to request Murty be ditched. We actually haven’t a clue what to do now.
The defence remains horrendous, Murty’s management debatable, and teams now know, thanks to Celtic and Kilmarnock, how to stop us.
What happens next? Your guess is as good as ours, folks.