Something a little different for this one, a bit more cerebral and maybe not for everyone, but there’s no denying the Rangers fan, in truth like most football fans, is basically not entirely to be taken at face value such are the hypocrisies and inconsistencies in the views espoused.
The one striking us right now is the dismissing of preseason results and performances, under the guise of ‘wait till there’s been a competitive match before you judge’ or ‘wait for Killie’.
Now that we’ve lost that one miserably, the goalposts shift to ‘just one match ffs’.
It tends to be that those who are defending something will always find a way to defend it – it’s not like they meant ‘wait for Killie’ literally, what they meant was ‘you’ll be quiet once we beat Killie’, because the individual in question isn’t going to turn around and say ‘oh, yes, we lost to Killie, you’re absolutely right to be concerned’.
A few do, in fairness, quite a few Rangers fans Ibrox Noise knows have actually changed from wide-eyed optimism to major concern following preseason and indeed Killie, but many don’t, and slam down those who do.
Another of our favourites is ‘give him a chance ffs’ which, when applied to Michael Beale, seems to ignore the fact he’s been Rangers’ manager for 9 months.
Another one would be ‘let him build his own team ffs’ (there’s a lot of ‘ffs’ in all this, you’ll notice) and then following some horrible performances ‘give them time to gel ffs’.
In short, those who are defending Beale’s management and the team’s current malaise, generally speaking, won’t shift from that, and will smack down dismissively on anyone who is more critical – they will keep shifting the Rangers goalposts rather than backing down from their own view.
And we admit, of course, that the reverse is true – those who are criticising Beale and the players are also rejecting outright any views to the contrary defending the situation.
And all of these people, ourselves included we’re sure, are guilty of amusing hypocrisy and inconsistency where football results, form and mood changes with the wind meaning an opinion which is ‘bang on’ one minute becomes ‘laughable’ the next.
Still, football is all about opinions. Right?