Since when was Rangers’ lynchpin ‘average’?

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Since when was Rangers’ lynchpin ‘average’?


The reaction to our Ryan Jack article was as unexpected as it was bizarre. Readers will know we were disappointed at best to Alex McLeish’s rejection of Jack in favour of pretty much anyone else, and we watched in mild amusement as Eck’s dismal dark blues crumped in a pathetic heap against the might of Kazakhstan.

Now, we’re not saying Jack would have saved the day by any means, but if anyone thinks the lad is far inferior to the dross out there or on its bench then we truly have no idea where you’re coming from.

In fact, the fact so many Rangers fans seemed to justify Eck’s decision and downright downplay Jack’s abilities made us not just frustrated, but genuinely sad at the mentality of a great number of our supporters now.

In the olden days it was called ‘handwringing’ – appeasing your enemies. And defending SFA FC’s decision and further insulting ‘average’ Ryan Jack was behaviour we simply don’t reconcile with any self-respecting Bear.

Ok, we hold our hands up – he’s not quite Barry Ferguson. But on top of being an outstanding defensive midfielder, the past two months he’s added some impressive central midfield and attacking midfield play – in fact, he’s admitted this has been the best season of his career and, until our article questioning the logic of his omission, most fans were hugely in praise of his contribution this season.

Obviously he missed Killie through apparent injury and that may well have been the very simple reason he wasn’t called up. But then so did Scott Arfield and Canada gave him the shout.

But regardless, the number of fans keen to castigate Jack in the past two weeks as average or even worse makes us wonder what we can define ‘support’ to be.

Sure, we’ve certainly been critical of players ourselves, but fleetingly – rather than generally showing disdain over a player’s tangible quality, it’s been over attitude or consistency – we’ve certainly given Morelos, Barisic and others a few barrels over their levels of contributions and attitude within – but if anyone can quote us within the past year as saying these guys weren’t actually decent players in the first place, we’ll stand corrected.

Indeed, in the distant past, before Jack put some matches and form together, we considered him underwhelming and wasn’t the Ryan Jack we’d believed we’d signed. And back then he probably wasn’t. But he hadn’t met Steven Gerrard yet, and now admits, like Morelos, that his new manager has absolutely gotten the best out of him.

And yet, fans suddenly decide he’s single fish?

He’s up for player of the year, no one had a complaint about that nomination at all – but suddenly he’s not good enough for the worst Scotland in history while the underperforming Borna Barisic’s callup was greeted with applause?

You gotta love the fickle fan.

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12 COMMENTS

  1. Ross Mccrorrie should be in ahead of Jack. Both for Rangers and Scotland. He was brought to Rangers as a tough tackling midfielder. Since signing that has gone from his game and his distribution is limited at best. Overrated by many bears unfortunately.

    • This is surreal. A month ago no one was saying anything like this. Funny how it's just suddenly changed. Guarantee a couple of stand out matches and he'll be the toast of the fickle fan again.

    • To be fair, we have also had Coulibaly, McCrorie, Rossiter and now Kamara for the CDM position. Jack has had to adapt for the sake of the team. He has done that. Hard to blame him for it.

  2. IN’ pretty much EVERY Scottish player is bang average maybe apart from Robertson from Liverpool, and our keeper AM who is on his day I think world class. Our teams results and inconsistenty is a good indicator that most of the players are bang average right now, anytime we step up against opposition thats even half decent and they nick a goal or set up defensive then we really struggle. It’s a fact! Our scotland team have been bang avaerage for past 15 years, hence why we never go to big tournaments. Compared to all the top leagues we have players mostly who are indeed average at best. Dry your eyes and write the next article.

    • This completely misses our point Martin and you well know it. Dry your eyes and write your next comment…

    • Gotta say I like Jack he can be immense if hes in the mood. He turns better than Baz did and has a tendency to pop up and get a tackke in when most needed. Scotlands team atm are a joke. 3-0 just naw. All wrong from the top to the bottom and major changes required. Big Eck seems to have lost the plot and half of the decent Scottish players. Really sad tbh.

  3. Without totally losing it again and getting on my fucking soap box !!! Scottish Football will never go anywhere unless we clear out the SFA top to bottom and establish a Football Set Up Like France Germany etc.etc All one system no coaching clique … Roxburgh Brown Fleeting Park and last but not least Malky Rotten Mob Racist and his entourage …I remember when we beat France at Hampden Mo Johnston scored …the French went away and fixed it then won all World Cup Euros etc . Until the Scottish government puts it's money where it's mouth is and stop Bobby sucking The Rotten Mob we will remain no where !!!

  4. Ibrox Noise you really are in the defensive these last few days.

    You delete comments from fellow bears because you don't like being confronted by some of the pish that's been written recently. Some 'forum'.

    And I actually used to like this site until today that Borna thread should just be taken down all together about 75% of us have slated it and that's why you spat the dummy out and deleted comments from folk you want to call fickle who in fact follow this club through thick and think. Disgusting.

    Let's not be deluded as the green bastards in the East is all we ask because it only embarrasses us when screenshots are taken and shared round to be laughed at for the pish that's been written.

    • We’ve let this through out of sheer courtesy. Coco, we don’t give a damn what the green and white forums you’re clearly on say about us or our club. We also never claimed to be balanced or neutral – you want that, there’s other sites which might sit on the fence.

      And if you say you like this site till it advocated one of our players’ value hiking through international involvement, we think that says it all.

      You’re welcome to post here, but if all you’re going to do is come on and criticise us, don’t be shocked if your views aren’t always published.

      We’re probably the only Rangers site who allow criticism of us to be aired. But don’t extract the urine with that please.

  5. IN you suggest in your article that many fans believe Ryan Jack is average. If that's the case then there surely must be something in it. It's wrong for you to criticise them for having that opinion. It's a site for opinions. If it was a handful of fans then maybe but it's clearly not. Personally I believe he is better than average but no more. And given our results this season the assessment that we are a team packed with average players is hard to argue with. Better than anytime in the last 7 years but still a long way to go.

    • They didn’t till two weeks ago Rob. THAT’S the problem. And it’s absurd to say we’re wrong for being critical of an opinion when so many comments do the same to us!

  6. I'm a great believer you are only good as your next game. Jack, like most of our team, has been inconsistent in performance. It would be wrong to single him out and not the rest.
    An above average player would give 95% consistency in all games throughout the season. Therefore Jack is an average player because he does not give you 95% consistency. I am not doubting Jacks ability, but I do doubt his, and others, commitment in games. So far our team have been one game wonders. Win a big game, bask in the fame, then lose or drop points in the weeks after. Just not good enough and Jack (as well as others) is just as much to blame!

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