Where does Ibrox Noise start with the wreckage that has been Rangers’ season thus far? It’s not just about yet another abysmal result against Polish sheep herders. It is about the overall picture. Somehow Rangers managed to make a bad situation even worse. This is arguably, if not definitively, Rangers’ worst ever start to a season in history. And Derek McInnes is done.
Rangers’ worst ever start?
Obviously, there are over a hundred years that we are looking at here, going back to good old 1872. And we are sure in the midst of time, there may have been an even worse start to a season than this. But off the top of our heads, and in research over the past 50 years, there has never been a start this atrocious.
Rangers have played absolute nobody teams. Dundee United, Hibs and Białystok twice. All of these teams are very beatable within Rangers’ normal rules. But those normal rules no longer seem to apply.
And Rangers fans are licking our wounds and sifting through the wreckage of another crash course of how not to do a season.
Derek McInnes has been an absolute farce
We can’t even just blame Derek McInnes. Yes, he has been an absolute farce. And probably worse than Russell Martin. Statistically, definitely worse.
Martin was able to negotiate two rounds of Champions League qualifiers, incredibly. McInnes crashed out at his first attempt at a Europa League qualifier against far more meagre opposition.
It’s bizarre, surreal and depressing to say it. Russell Martin was a better manager for Rangers than Derek McInnes has been.
And when we got our man all those weeks ago, nay, months, those were words we never thought we’d be saying.
Now the fans have spoken, after we asked them who do they believe was to blame. Was it McInnes? Was it recruitment? The owners? The players? Or all of the above?
Overwhelmingly, the answer was recruitment. Fans were blaming the signings, and indeed the processes taken to find those signings.
Rangers’ recruitment takes the blame
We do and don’t agree with this. It doesn’t matter at the level of which recruitment is taking place. Anyone can tell that the players that we’re bringing in are fairly average and nowhere near traditional Rangers levels. But they are still better than the slop that Dundee United or Hibs would bring in.
They are also better than the rubbish that Białystok would bring in. Rangers are playing against far inferior teams, and being completely outclassed by all and sundry.
The starting XIs from McInnes are also a huge factor. Every single starting eleven that Ibrox Noise has looked at, our collective eyes have rolled into the back of our heads. And we have prayed for mercy.
Because any blind man who is willing to see can tell that these atrocious selections are nowhere near the right ones. Or even remotely competent.
Then there’s the substitutions. We can’t fathom a single one of them. The players are there in the squad, that can be reasonably well organised to do a bit of something.
We are not saying traditional Rangers level. But McInnes appears to just be pinning the tail on the donkey here. There is no coherent system, nothing that works, at least not by him.
McInnes is killing Rangers
Now this is not exactly easy for Ibrox Noise or indeed other fans to accept. But McInnes is killing the club at the moment. Even worse than Russell Martin was.
We did consider him a Rangers man. We have completely changed our minds on that one now. And we have lots of reasons to do so, which we will explain in due course.
But for now, the wreckage of another season is already there. Out of the Europa League at the first attempt, crashed to ninth place in the Premiership.
This is an absolute bombscare of a campaign. And just when you thought Rangers couldn’t screw you over more, they get out the Black & Decker. And twist a little further. And Derek McInnes is done as a result.
It’s fun being a Rangers fan.