Oleg_Mcnoleg

I confidently predict it'll be Eck to the summer, then McInnes. I should add I'm mostly wrong about this sort of thing

Quite though I thought was covered by the 'yet to be met' bit. But the only thing that is clear is that this is an utter fucking shambles

Ok, either the club's website and twitter have been hacked or, more likely, we're into a contractual mess where MW and team have offered to go under certain, yet to be met, conditions and the club has just pulled the plug anyway.

If it's Billy Davies, I'm hitting random strangers, for the record.

What a total clusterfuck

I'm not convinced but, if it is the case, then they should get the fuck on with it. Weeks of innuendo and rumour in social media and red top sports pages is doing the club no good whatsoever. And Warburton has, thus far, seemed to conduct himself well and, regardless of recent results, deserves better than this apparent death by 1000 cuts.

We've had two pretty honking transfer windows since McParland arrived. We've missed out on players we thought we were getting and it's hard to argue that those who have arrived have contributed consistently. All of which means that either he's been poor or he's not had the necessary support from the club to get deals done. So if he and/or the manager do get relieved of their duties, the board will have nowhere else to pass the blame if it doesn't pick up. And I'm not sure what those having a go at Kiernan think they're going to achieve. We all get frustrated but most of us can manage not to yell abuse at people, especially those we'd like to see improve.

Think it was on FF that somebody said that the root cause of his problem had finally been identified and could be resolved over the medium to long term but he might not play until after Easter. I might have remembered the dates wrong but the jist of it was that we'd seem him before the end of the season and things were looking good for next. I'll not be holding my breath though

We've shown no ability to sign better than him right now. He looks after himself and can still contribute so I'd be fine with keeping him.

Then who the hell is? Arguably our best player this season (not a great honour, admitedly. Hill? Foderingham?).

I agree. However, regardless of the rights and wrongs of it or where fault lies, where the manager's tenure is essentially holed below the water line. If we could just stick the ball in the net a bit more regularly, things can certainly turn around. But note the 'if'. It's not MW who couldn't score in a brothel and he's being let down by players but that's fitba. (not saying scoring is our only problem, incidentally. But our conversion rate is a disgrace and getting us into trouble in other respects).

Part of the problem is with whipping balls into a packed penalty area. An awful lot of what Warburton has tried to do has been to pull defences about to mitigate this. It clearly hasn't worked though. Agree on the two-footed thing though. My old man spent his footballing days with Spartans. He could kick the ball well with both feet and he wasn't getting paid to play football all fucking day.

Waghorn couldn't shoot fish in a barrel at the moment. He'd probably miss the barrel.

we've shown no ability to sign anyone who is a solution. Nobody thinks KM can go on indefinitely but he's fit, experienced and better than any of the other strikers at the club. That may be an indictment of the others but it's where we are.

They've mostly fallen to Waghorn (who's missed them). I understand that teams tend to defend deep which makes getting beyond defences hard. But how teams manage to both defend deep and press us high up as well can be included in one of the lists of strange and unexplainable phenomena like the Bermuda Triangle or Big Foot.

I think you draw a rather harder line between Green and his successors and Ashley than the evidence would warrant. I'm not sure we'll ever get a full explanation of why Green and his successors felt so desperate to hand Ashley the club in installments in return for small loans but I think it fair to hypothesise a relationship. After all, we still had arseholes like 'Ashley associate' Lambias hanging around until forcibly removed. Besides which, Ashley is very much still with us whereas Green is a fading memory (though I sincerely hope we'll all get to see him in court before too long).

I've said it already but like the sound of my own voice so I'll say it again. I always thought we'd concede too many daft goals this season. But I thought it would be because we got too gung ho with our attacking play. But we're not gung ho at all and too often far too slow and stodgy in our play. And, to be blunt, our conversion rate is utterly shite.

Quite. I've said much the same on other threads. We've had two absolutely dreadful transfer windows. Missed out on players we were after, not strengthened areas which needed it and, as you note, too many of those who have come in haven't had enough impact for one reason or another. I can remember Alex Ferguson talking about the importance of transfers. It wasn't just about bringing in players to fill holes in the squad but psychologically important, to keep the squad motivated and give a sense of momentum. We've clearly lost all our momentum.

I think it would be easier to forgive the defensive flakiness if we were an exhilarating attacking force that gave away the odd daft goal through being too cavalier. It's certainly what I expected from MW. But we've not been.

After his self-defence in The Sun, the Record gives the case for the prosecution. http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/opinion/sport/rangers-end-game-fast-approaching-9748708 "Rangers end game is fast approaching for Mark Warburton after recruitment drive leaves him out of gas Every manager at every club is in the last year of their contract – only some don’t know it. Mark Warburton will have awakened to an uncomfortable truth yesterday morning that he’s approaching the end game at Rangers. Embarrassing as it may be for Ibrox fans, forget the fact rampant Celtic have already disappeared over the title horizon, a staggering 25 points to the good at the top of the Premiership table. Despite the pre-season marketing bluster, “Going for 55” was never a realistic target for the Rangers board this season, a point of which Warburton has long been aware. A title challenge, at least until early spring, would have reassured Rangers directors that their manager was taking the club in the right direction, even if they were to fall up to 10 points short of championship success. Mark Warburton always knew his side wouldn't be challenging for the title At the very least they were banking on a comfortable second-placed finish, which would have reflected the size of the Ibrox budget in comparison to Hearts and Aberdeen. To date, it is the failure of Rangers to underline their credentials for that latter challenge that is exercising minds at the top of the marble staircase. Warburton is working with a pot of finance up to four times of that available to Derek McInnes at Pittodrie and Ian Cathro at Tynecastle but his team is going backwards, despite a budget increase of 50 per cent to more than £10million in the summer. Rangers manager Mark Warburton comes out fighting and insists he's not feeling under any pressure His recruitment process has been dreadful, which is why director of football Frank McParland and his signing policy were subject to such careful cross examination at last week’s Ibrox board meeting by chairman Dave King and managing director Stewart Robertson. Also, do not underestimate the influence in the Ibrox set up – not least financially – of Douglas Park and his son, Graeme, but they did not grow a business that now turns over £500m annually on making angry, knee-jerk reactions. Frank McParland's signing policy has been coming under scrutiny by the Ibrox board Rangers directors are not blameless – we’ll get to them in a minute – but if Warburton and McParland are to survive, and if their minds aren’t already wandering elsewhere, they must find solutions to key questions now spreading to the wider Ibrox support. ● How much value has Warburton added to the current squad, particularly players brought to the club? Wes Foderingham apart, none have added considerably to their transfer worth. ● How far is McParland extending his recruitment network and is he well enough connected to more than just a handful of player agencies? ● What legacy would Warburton leave if he was to depart Ibrox tomorrow? Rangers did not receive a single bid for a player in the January window. A handful of the squad apart, it would be a case of rip it up and start again. ● Can the manager be trusted with transfer market funds? Rangers spent the best part of £3m last year on players – Joe Garner, Joe Dodoo, Jordan Rossiter and Michael O’Halloran – and they’ve all struggled to impact. ● Can Rangers carry upwards of £50,000-a-week in wages for players who aren’t starting, particularly Philippe Senderos, the injury-prone Rossiter, Dodoo, Danny Wilson, O’Halloran and Garner? ● Does Warburton really “get” Scottish football? His side were as off the pace in their 4-1 hammering against high-tempo Hearts as they were two months earlier when they went down 2-0 at Tynecastle. The manager has shown no appetite for change. ● How can such a fine defender as Davie Weir oversee such a hapless rearguard that has now lost more than a goal a game, with only Hearts conceding more often in the top six? ● Why does the balance of this team so frustrate Gers fans? They’ve been crying out for a dominant centre-half and physicality in the middle of the park since Warburton took over but too many lightweight midfielders fold when the top-flight going gets tough. Dave King is being accused of not backing Mark Warburton Contrary to popular belief, money is available to strengthen the squad again this summer, although King would have been best served holding fire on the hubristic talk of £30m war chests when he overthrew the detested former regime. King and the Parks in particular have already committed the best part of £20m taking control of their club and restoring it to a position of stability. Ironically, one of their greatest acts of generosity came last summer when they rewarded Warburton and Weir with new contracts and salary increases that took their joint package to around £1m a year. They should have been monitored for the first half of the season and, if appropriate, a new deal tabled in January. With the security of a three-year deal, the manager might just decide to sit tight, no matter how much he may fidget in future under boardroom questioning."

I said on one of the other threads that the long-term project risks being undermined by basic, Sunday league-levels balls-ups. I want MW to succeed and, to be honest, I really can't see what the alternative to it is: have a look at the FF for evidence that we're in danger of losing our perspective completely - Billy fucking Davies!!! However, we're not a young, dynamic attacking force that's getting undone through defensive naivety. Too often, we're stodgy and slow, we can't score and from time to time, put in shifts like last night. Frustration is we should be able to: some of our best performances last season were against premier league teams but they seem a long time ago right now.

The frustrating thing about Tavernier is he can defend. Sort of. He's rarely beaten one on one. It's just that he goes to sleep. Hodson is better in that respect but his distribution is horrible. Swings and roundabouts. DB's point that Hyndman is usually a more defensive midfielder is interesting because he looks our most potent attacking midfielder by quite a long way right now. Only one who seems to have much drive or directness right now. Was rather hoping we'd get that from Windass too but don't seem to be able to rely on it.

I don't think hearts were poor but it's hard to be objective when we were so completely shite. The frustration is we got ourselves back into it and looked ok before shooting ourselves in the genitalia at the start of the second. What bothers me, and bothered me at the beginning of the season, is that teams seem to manage to press us high and defend deep against us. That shouldn't be possible.

All the goals were entirely avoidable. Although Walker certainly finished his chances well, they were the result of our balls-ups. I know the line about all goals being the result of a mistake somewhere but those were fucking embarrassing, to be honest. I'm not calling for the manager's head at all and I fully appreciate that we are where we are in terms of rebuilding and finances. But that is the sort of stuff that loses managers jobs (especially as we score so few that we can't accommodate defensive flakiness).

Quite. A lot comes down to the state of our transfer dealings over the summer. Barton was brought in for the leadership mentioned. He, along with Rossiter, were evidently supposed to take some of the weight off Halliday (who looked like he'd been mainlining Ovaltine last night. Probably knackered). And we were obviously after more quality in central defence and only ended up with Senderos after other options failed. Who knows whether Warburton was after holding midfielders in the break but if you're forced to call favours to get loans, you pretty much get what you're given.