Could forgotten change be major reason for Rangers’ struggles?

6
Could forgotten change be major reason for Rangers’ struggles?
GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - FEBRUARY 24: Rangers manager Giovanni van Bronckhorst is seen during the UEFA Europa League Knockout Round Play-Offs Leg Two match between Rangers FC and Borussia Dortmund at Ibrox Stadium on February 24, 2022 in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

As we scale a port mortem on yet another bad domestic result this season, one thing is starting, just creeping back into a spot of reckoning.

Admittedly we’ve not seen it mentioned anywhere, it’s just our own theory, and it is something we were curious about, which, going by recent results, is starting to emerge as feasibly true.

Two things have simply not changed despite the change of manager:

Bad domestic results after new year.

And the bigger one:

Struggling in front of domestic fans.

Is there any coincidence Rangers’ 55 was in front of empty stadia? This squad, pretty much the same as last season, is back to playing as badly as it did pre-55, as inconsistently, and with the same results.

The big difference from 55, regardless of who the boss is, is that they’re doing it in front of fans now.

The players choked at Parkhead, and they choked today. They’ve choked at lesser arenas too.

We always wondered how the players would adapt to playing in front of fans again, well, this season, aside Europe (which they always seem to excel in), there’s been a tanking.

We have already drawn an absurd SEVEN domestic matches and lost two. We drew 6 ALL last season and of course lost none.

Gio’s record overall now is about the same as SG’s was till Gio took over, the change in manager hasn’t really changed anything. Initially there was a honeymoon but the reality of the squad’s mental strength is appearing now, and domestically it’s incredibly inconsistent.

That said Gio has made errors, no question – we’re always honest on this site and no matter how much we love a player or manager we call out fallacies always. So we can always admit where fault lies, if it’s with the boss.

But there’s no doubt that the team he selected, albeit a bit of a mess, should still have been able to put away the worst side on domestic form in the SPL.

They literally bottled it, and it’s not something they did at Ibrox last season with no fans around.

The only, single, scant consolation is that this horrible draw wasn’t compounded with our city rivals winning, and they too stumbled badly.

We do, however, remain 3 behind and had a chance to make it 1 today. Knowing what the players knew, they absolutely tanked the chance to make up most of the gap.

This shows a lack of guts, attitude, and general malaise.

In truth, if we’re to find one other scant consolation of this shambles, it’s that Celtic are miserably awful as well. Both sides, domestically, are complete **** and neither convinces.

The winner of the SPL this season will be the less bad side, not the best side.

What a crock.

No posts to display

6 COMMENTS

  1. Sorry , don’t agree. This was slack unprofessional and the manager is mostly to blame. Why change the back four that went through on Thursday . Why stop pressing the game and changing the front set up. It’s not acceptable GVB got this game totally wrong .

  2. Oh come on, IN, it’s the same players who *didn’t* bottle it on Thursday. You can’t have it both ways. This has nothing to do with crowds and everything to do with poor defending and poor refereeing. We should have paid for Souttar in January, so that is definitely a strike against the management (whoever made that decision). Goldson is good against crosses but is not a good penalty box defender. Not sure why Lundstram was not replaced by Balogun after the first goal, a strike against GvB, for sure. But, the team created numerous opportunities and only desperate defending and poor refereeing stopped us scoring at least another 4 goals. You’ve spoken about how lucky the Mhanky Mhob have been recently, scoring last minute goals etc. Well my take is that we’ve been on the other side of that luck in, at least, the last two draws. It is also significant that we scored six goals against a Bundesliga giant with the aid of good referees and VAR.

    • Bear in mind the use of the word ‘domestic’. In bold. It’s never been a problem in Europe. Only domestic.

      • Yes, I see that, but why would they be any different? Is the crowd less demanding in a Euro game? I think the pressure on Thursday (from the crowd) would have been greater than on Sunday – at least up to the point when Motherwell scored their second!

        Perhaps another flaw in this team is their lack of a true poacher like McCoist/Boyd or Defoe, who can come on and always get a goal?

      • The domestic gets you into Europe, if your 6th in league do you get it, way we’re going we will be some years, Europe nice but not bread n butter n last 16 been our pinnacle so hardly winning there are we, the errors are clear to see, n two managers can’t see them, how many years playing, captain n how many trophies, blinkered by stopping 10 in a row, which was nice, but were fucking given it, goldson fuck off

Comments are closed.