101,254 reasons to grow the global Rangers brand

As Rangers fans know, getting Our Rangers back is utmost priority. Building our club back to the behemoth it should be. We don’t expect to win the Champions League any time soon; just forming a credible challenge to Celtic is the medium term aim. Maybe Steven Gerrard will deliver that, who knows, but last night’s International Champions Cup clash between Manchester United and his old team Liverpool gave another insight into long-term strategy that Rangers should be aiming towards.

Michigan’s Big House was the venue for this match, in a tournament with increasing relevance. Only the biggest and best names get invited and over the years they’ve started sending their best players; because they know the American market is a huge one, as evidenced by the quite impalpable 101,254 crowd who showed up for a match between two English teams (still not as big as Utd Madrid in the same ground which was 110k).

Not only that, but there were hardly any ex-pats in the audience, with, instead, a mostly home-based crowd filling out the rafters for what must be one of the biggest overseas matches of two British football teams in recent memory.

Ibrox Noise, some years ago, discussed Rangers’ failure to exploit global markets – this was just after our troubles of 2012, and last night’s crowd in USA rather epitomises the success British clubs can have with good overseas marketing.

Often the argument is ‘they’re on TV over there, that’s why they’re so big’ – yes, and they’re on TV because the USA wants giant brands like Manchester United and Liverpool – and giant brands like these two want the USA market. Those brands have grown themselves through sheer graft and that’s why they are now big business in the USA and the Far East. Name is only one part of a club’s global appear, they have to actually put ‘boots on the ground’ and do the work it takes.

The SPFL, in a rare defence of them, did actually try to get Scottish football on the global map recently with a TV deal in China – a good move, for a market of 1.3B people. As yet we are not yet really seeing the benefits of this deal, nor its broadcast range in that country, but Rangers (and our green and white friends) have a long way to go before an overseas Old Firm match gets even half of Utd’s crowd. Even 25k would be a big success.

Even Celtic, who proclaim to be ‘the most popular club on earth’, couldn’t even fill a 15k stadium out to a third when they visited Armenia recently, while we saw how empty the Phillips II stadium was in Macedonia v Shkupi. We fared slightly better for the Croatian clash, where 7,000 showed up to a 19k arena, but still Rangers and Celtic are a long way from fulfilling their marketing potential.

But this is about Rangers.

We must say the Steven Gerrard effect has been significant, given his brand globally is probably bigger than Rangers and Celtic’s combined.

Gerrard is the most famous football icon since Gazza to make his way to Scotland and Rangers (and Scottish football) will only benefit from that.

But more needs done for Rangers to realise our potential – it’s a wasted opportunity to see a huge brand like Rangers failing to have any global standing like they should – markets are there to be exploited, and thousands if not millions of new fans are waiting to hand over their cash and grow our club.

But we need to do the groundwork and that part needs some TLC.