ascender

I still think bringing Hemdani in would have been worth a go this season as our defence has been well shaky since day one and we've given away some very slack goals. Giving them more protection might have helped, even though it would have meant us playing a bit more of a negative formation even in the SPL.

As for Beasley, I thought he had potential to do a job for us and still do, but there's no doubt he's gone off the boil. He was never the finished article, but I thought once he settled and had a run in the team he'd give us some pace & width.

I don't understand having someone like Hemdani in the squad and not using him as the guy is obviously talented. He could have come in as a direct replacement for Thomson when he got injured but unfortunately Ferguson came back then and that was that.

I also don't understand not giving Beasley a run on the left. I thought he did fairly well for us last season before getting injured and while many have said he's too lightweight, I thought the exact opposite. He got stuck in and looked much more determined than many wingers I've seen recently, not to say he wasn't afraid of having a pop at goal. Where did it all go wrong for him?

Its strange when you see the list of players WS has signed and how few are actually regulars for us. Scary when you see just how much they've cost as well. If a few of them were for the future then why weren't they loaned back to the clubs we signed them from or put out on loan elsewhere for example?

The whole Gow thing has just been baffling, even moreso now that he's obviously impressed during his loan spell and still isn't deemed good enough for us. I could understand it if we were 12 points clear at the top and cruising, but we're not.

Oh well, good luck to the lad.

I don't have anything personal against Ferguson, he was one of my favourite players before he left, but he's just not playing well enough or showing the leadership we should get from our captain. Regardless of his part in the PLG affair, I don't think its right that he walked straight back in to the team, particularly as he wasn't playing well before he was injured.

Shockerooni.

Not David Healy again.... I expect us to be linked with Robbie Fowler within the day.

So we paid 1M for this guy, he looked good in pre-season and now he's disappeared from our plans. How on earth can WS justify that kind of waste of money time and time again? The old boys act with SDM and WS looks like getting us in to all sorts of trouble.

What a load of nonsense. We might have got that for him last season but at the moment he's worth about half of that going on his current form!

The Guardian reckon Newcastle are interested in him.

I don't think JCD is wrong in what he is saying, after all he was offered his salary, he accepted,and then he was asked to leave, he accepted it. Thanks for your services JCD and all the best

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't having a go at him whatsoever. He just got the best deal possible for him.

Agreed.

 

If it's not out of control then the CEO's head should roll for gross negligence.

 

If it is out of control then the CEO's head should roll for gross incompetence.

That's the thing, a few of us commented on that at the time, but this just seems to be further proof that we're now going back to paying over the odds for players wages. And given JCD's track record, I can't believe we had to pay him a lot to come here in the first place.

I HATE the transfer window. I wish I could just ignore all press and websites until its closed again but curiosity gets the better of me.

We've been linked with Neilson for years now. The guy seems to be pretty inconsistent, but I suppose he's an experienced SPL player and more importantly, it would be good to have an actual RB playing at RB.

As for Miller, no thanks. I don't think I need to explain why

How on earth can the medial team not pick up on a player being ill? Surely their normal (and hopefully daily) monitoring of players fitness would have picked this up? Or at least a sign of it like his resting heart rate being higher than normal?

Ridiculous. Someone's at it.

Another one from the Evening Times. What I find strange in all of this is that you've got an experienced manager, who's an older man, who let this situation get out of control instead of dealing with it at the time. He then behaved very immaturely and childishly with many of his comments to the media (as did his assistant), so you could only assume that they didn't give a stuff about Boyd. At the time it was also pointed out that his reasons for not playing Boyd were completely unfounded as there were many others on the park who had played for their teams less than Boyd had done for us.

Meanwhile Boyd has been playing very well for us and has made marked improvements in all aspects of his game. Over at Hampden Park, the national side are still dropping points. Suddenly you have Butcher and now Burley talking about a return for Boyd. But it seems that even now they can't be the bigger men and put things behind them as both have made comments which aren't quite the olive branch they might seem at first.

Butcher says that Boyd must first apologise while Burley now comes out and has obviously told the Herald that Boyd needs to improve his attitude. So basically they still think they're blameless in all of this.

I'd love to see Boyd playing for Scotland again, but to be honest, I wouldn't blame him if he told them to stick it.

George Burley last night cleared the way for Kris Boyd to reclaim his place in Scotland's World Cup qualification campaign. The national manager revealed he is "open" to the idea of Boyd reconsidering his international retirement but The Herald understands that the Rangers striker would only be made welcome if he showed a vast improvement in attitude.

And are we still living outwith our means while chasing impossible dreams? Look at what JCD has to say about his time here. Maybe its just me, but I find it very worrying that we paid a player like him so much cash. I thought we had our wage budget under control after Bain sorted it out a few years ago.

If we are still paying big money on wages, should I be unduly worried about our overall financial stability? The latest figures made for depressing reading and given the lack of success on the park, does this not just confirm that the club is being run in a very risky way again? Did SDM not learn anything from what happened when DA was here?

Evening Time - Darche�s Rangers bonanza

 

Former Ibrox forward Jean-Claude Darcheville has revealed how he earned so much money during his time at Rangers that he could afford to take a pay cut and move to Valenciennes.

 

Darcheville returned to France last week to help the Ligue One club's battle against relegation.

 

The 33-year-old hit man said: "Financially, I assured my future in Scotland and I can afford this experience now. If that wasn't the case I'd have gone to Qatar or Dubai to take the money and finish my career.

 

"I made financial sacrifices to come here, but I want to help my team-mates stay in Ligue 1.

 

"Through my agent I had contact with Valenciennes three or four weeks ago. I also spoke with Nantes coach Elie Baup and to the president of Monaco and knew other opportunities would arise as well.

 

"But the manager Antoine Kombouare found the words to convince me to join Valenciennes. He understood I was a man of character."

Happy New Year all!

This guy was out for months with a serious knee injury, what the hell are you thinking smith??? this bloody guy is injury prone.

Like others have said, that just makes him an ideal signing for us.

Has Webster been playing on loan or has he been injured again?

I think we all said on here during the summer that WS seemed to be signing the wrong players in terms of the positions we needed cover for. Its depressing to see so many players being played out of position with many more simply not being given a chance to show what they can do at all.

Deportivo are now being linked with him.

If we're targetting the likes of Shiels, Wilkie, Cowie etc I'm surprised we never went for Ian Black he's no worse than the above names mentioned IMO. I'm not saying he's someone I would go for but he would give you more effort than some we are being linked with and most of the squad we have just now IMO and he was a free at the end of this season!

I thought that too. While I've never been that impressed by Black and he picks up his fair share of bookings, at least it would give us a terrier (I hate that word but you know what I mean) sort of player in the midfield, snapping at players ankles and playing with a bit of urgency.

As for the Shiels thing, its been doing the rounds for a while, but most people reckoned it was just agent talk.

So taking Adam as an example, where did it all go wrong? Is he just not applying himself in training? Not taking his diet and extra fitness training seriously? Is he not getting the coaching he needs to bring him on to the next level?

Its just that he clearly has talent, but seems to have gone backwards over the last while rather than improving to the point where he can't even get the basics right.

The same could be said of Whittaker who looked like one of the best young players in the SPL before he joined us.

George Graham is another I have wanted in the past but has he been out the game too long now? Who could we attract at this time given the state of our current affairs?

He's someone else I'd like to see at Ibrox, but like you say, maybe he's been out of the game for too long now.

Why sign Aaron if he wasn't going to play him? The same could be said for Edu.

I'd love to see Souness back as Chairman tbh. Sort the discipline of the club out from the top and stand up for us in the press. That would be a good start in my eyes.

I think McCoist is being groomed to be manager, but given he's part of a failing managerial team, that doesn't fill me with confidence. Of course the other problem is that from what I've seen, I think we're on a seriously shaky financial peg.

For me its fairly simple what our problems are, but my biggest issue is the fact many of these have gone unanswered for 5 years or so.

• Lack of creativity in the midfield
  
• Lack of width
  
• Lack of tactical awareness on the touchline
  
• Lack of leadership on the park
  
• Playing players out of position rather than giving younger/reserve players a chance
  
• Seemingly untouchable players in the side who are immune to being dropped
  
• A complete lack of a scouting network
  
• What exactly does our youth setup do?
  
• Blatant mis-spending of transfer funds on players we don't need while overlooking key areas which need strengthened
  

There is of course the other issue about the way our club is being run (in to the ground), but I don't see how the above aren't being dealt with as they're blindingly obvious.

But most of that list is much more important to me rather than slagging off individual players tbh.

Needs to be given a chance in his correct position

 

He is never a midfield player. Everyone can see it except Smith

That's what I think too. Feel sorry for the lad, especially after Smith said he wouldn't play him out of position after signing him.