der Berliner

Typical Buddies game so far. ... never knew Declan John was back in Scottish football, snapped up by Saints on a free.

The Eisbären were playing Augsburg Panthers last night in a very similar situation like we face St. Mirren today. While the former are sitting firmly in second place (and well-placed for the playoffs), Augsburg were just above the Playoff zone and needed a win - game 47 of 52 of the regular season. Much like St. Mirren needs points to stay in the top 6. Despite a fair amount of regular players missing, quality proved the key and the Eisbären ran out 5-0 victors. Over to you, Rangers!

Anyone checked what belongs to this 49ers enterprise and how they fare?

Last time I played Fantasy Football was 10 years ago, after that, my interest in what is going on in the EPL essentially vanished. Hence, I am mildly shocked and surprised when I do see the odd highlight from England: teams like Brighton, Brentford, Bournemouth, Wolves, and dare I say it Forest and Newcastle are challenging for Champions League places. Teams which I associate with 2nd to 4th tier in my memories. Their supporters probably live the dreams of their fathers, grandfathers and even great great grandfathers. Maybe we should ask them whether they lost any of their traditions and histories, their rivalries etc.? The simple fact is that we are still caught in our goldfish bowl that won't get us much revenue, or the revenue required to play with the sharks out there. It is highly doubtful that any US or other cash will change this in the foreseeable future. What it can change is the current plight of not being able to overcome the Scottish clubs to get us straight entry into the CL riches. IMHO, we are actually not that much worse than them, yet we don't play to our strengths and/or don't have players that give us continuous level of the performance required. Hence, we do need investment. It is quite bizarre that Rangers teams who can't beat Scottish dross on a regular basis can beat multi-million teams on their way to the EL final or the last 16. One might even be willing to give credit to them for taking BL leaders Bayern almost to extra time. Might. The foundations are there, yet we need some change to the status quo, or the attempted skyscraper will just remain a nice detached house ...

Better this than any one single billionaire / US-oligarch type of chap with only business in mind. Mind you, my local ice-hockey team is owned by the Anschutz Entertainment Group, which in turn owns all these Uber / Barclaycard Arenas and O2 Worlds in Europe, as well as the L.A. Kings, L.A. Galaxy, Hammarby IF, Los Angeles Lakers etc. ...

... while writing this at HT, before my inner eye, I saw the final result as it is now. You somehow knew that Hearts wouldn't score, and that we'll grab a few more, somehow. More paper over the cracks, though. NB: No, it is MY inner eye, it's mine, my treasure ... you won't get it. (Unless we share any instant bet profits!)

They should be fined for sloppy and dangerous passes from the back ...

Butland without doubt the best man in Blue out there ... well, Rangers colours. Our team-play is as bad as it was against Queens Park. Bad and sloppy passing, shocking decision-making. Hearts are flying, formwise, and we toil along. For some reason, Hearts always gave us a fight over the last decade ... let's hope the end result will be similar as before though.

Cerny's passing is awful so far, and he'S not alone.

We start playing out of the back again, against a team that does the press well. That's twice Hearts have wasted super positions now. BTW, where's Raskin? Only saw him at our corners.

... the problem is, even despite Beaton, that this team will probably produce a semi-sublime performance to PC in the job.

Any bets on Shankland to finally sink our season?

Football, that funny old game ... FA Cup last weekend Plymouth Argyle 1 Liverpool 0 ... one of the first games for Katic who got top marks, and a penalty goal decider by a certain Ryan Hardie. Tonight, Europa Conference League Molde 0 Shamrock Rovers 1 (after 82 mins) Vikingur Reykjavik 2 Panathinaikos 0 (same)

Caught up in our grumpy mood ( 😱😜 ) you probably missed the point of the sentence ... IMHO, we need someone who understands the task at hand, i.e. Scottish league titles. Be that Muscat or someone else. Hence, there should be Scots involved at some point, McCann, Weir or the like. These two were just examples of people who know what makes our hearts tick. What is necessary for Rangers FC, as it runs through their veins. We don't need either of the Scottish guys mentioned as managers, but as people who tell the guy at the helm about the direction the ship must sail.

It's kind of sickening to note that not only did we hand them the title three times on the trot, but with that also the ability to reap the rewards WE achieved in Europe, i.e. direct entry to the CL without qualifiers. IMHO, we need someone who understands the task at hand, i.e. Scottish league titles. Be that Muscat or someone else. Hence, there should be Scots involved at some point, McCann, Weir or the like. I have no idea what sort of input Rae has, but it seemingly is not enough. As it stands, we're a project club that simply has no time for being a project club. Not in the here and now. And we have neither to scout Europe etc. for special talent, we need solid people who can do a job in Scotland. In that respect, it is truly amazing (in the worst way imaginable) that they snatch up supposedly weak Japanese guys who run rings around Scottish fridge throwers and score goals for fun.

The English 3rd tier, to be precise. But even there money is about and they are bound for promotion too. Both have one year to run, and we should demand solid money for both, not least if they prove their worth in England.

There are two things that make up my "worst" losses on the field of play. One is obvious cheating by the referees against them - e.g. the last two cup finals, and various league games (e.g. Maeda fouls Cantwell in the area, the latter being wrecked for months; no penalty given; Cerny clearly being fouled in injury time of the League Cup final, no penalty given). The other is abject performances against them by people who can do much better. We are used to people running themselves into ground for the gersey, but nowadays, with hardly a true Scottish/Glesca root in the squad, we have "mercenaries" who by default change their loyalties every 2 or 4 years in their career. And you wonder whether they actually understand the true spirit of the club. For us, nigh every game is do or die. While a loss to Niederkorn is hard to take, it was essentially pre-season and freak results are common. While bitter, that mauling at the hands of Liverpool was bad too, yet, the gulf in class was obvious. Sunday wasn't amongst the worst in my living memory. It was bad because we never really performed as a team, and while missing some good chances, never put them under any sustained real pressure bar the last 10 mins. Possession stats may belie this, but we looked fully defunct as a team. This makes the result even worse. One of the "worst" was obviously the Europa League final, as we once more put up a defensive line-up rather alien to the team that produced the actual feat to get there. Aribo as the lone striker gave me a few sleepless moments, no matter that he actually managed to score.

The board does not select the line-up and players. That is where we failed, first and foremost. The board can't generate money from nothing, nor can they make other teams buy players at the prices we want. I have no doubt that they look for investment, but if nothing is about, they can't conjure things up either. Thus, criticism where it is due. But a reality check and objective considerations are required too.

You know, I fear that in the summer, most of our better players - having seen what happens here or having money-rich suitors - will be off, while we will be left with a coach who assembles a team that he will use to try to cure the symptoms, but not the disease/problem ...

For some reason, after him being the lethal spearhead in his first few games, he was probably told to fall back somewhat, which he duly did. Quite often of late, he roams around, even to the halfway line. Or he appears on either wing. Given that neither of his fellow attackers is a goalscorer, such tactics have removed quite a chunk of the threat he poses. Yesterday was the same ... and one cannot "blame" this on a fellow striker playing "in front" of him, for there wasn't (until Dessers arrived). A German reporter who commented on a recent Europa League game described PC's tactics as an "attacking defensive" line-up, essentially the 4-2-3-1 we see every week. That may work in Europe or against them, but is shockingly inefficient against teams that de facto hardly ever attack. And even if they do, the line-up shows horrific deficiencies - like yesterday. I knew what was coming when Tavernier appeared time and again near in a central attacking position, trying to play an AM role (or whatever). Thus, our other main goal-threat in this line-up, Cerny, was left alone on the right wing, facing two defenders. It's been a long time since I woke up at 5 a.m. and couldn't find sleep again due to this whole dire state of the team and its management - not the club. It is apparent that PC is not able to understand what it takes to take us to a level able to beat the Scottish dross. While the finance department is sure licking its fingers over the European money, the blood and bones of the club, i.e. us, is being treated with standards unacceptable for Rangers FC. Dozens of far worse Rangers teams were well able to beat the 4th to 2nd tier teams on a weekly basis. Yet here we have to endure internationals and multi-million pound signings unable to string a handful of decent and acceptable results together. And a coach who sticks to tactics that have been proven worthless dozens of times.

It just was another disaster waiting to happen. We don't score enough goals due to bad tactics, and if the players can't get their act together, we are very very ordinary. The opposition needs but 1 to 3 chances per game to score, and they usually do. This was not the worst we suffered as a game. But in a season of many lows, this is another bottom benchmark. I feel truly ashamed that once more, I can't be bothered that much. This team has drained a lot of my belief in football. Not in Rangers, obviously.

Hats off to the Spiders, who didn't even have to work for this famous scalp. 4-2-3-1 at its worst, with a team without any sort of cohesion or ability to string even a few solid attacking passes together. The first one came in 92 mins. We talk about the dire days and horrific under Pedro, but this current side is going from shocking to marvellous and shocking again in no time. What a mess ...

Super-fast VAR checks ... 😂

Why the heck do they still want to pass themselves over the goal-line. Only to play it back to someone who shoots over the bar?

We have been shocking from midfield onwards, this was just the usual one chance we like to give away. How you can from Union St. Gillois and Tottenham to such performance is beyond joke.