JohnMc

If we're really looking at out of contract free agent players then I'd prefer we signed Mandžukić. He's a type of striker we don't have and his physical style would suit Scottish football, with a couple of Croats here already and our previous success with strong Croatian forwards I think he's be a good fit. He's 34 so I doubt he could play 2 games a week and has probably lost a bit of pace and energy, but as an option for us even from the bench he offers something different that might complement the more technical forwards we currently have. I've not heard him mentioned by anyone and I've no inside knowledge, this is simply a Sunday morning daydream. By the way I don't believe there's a 'no-compete' clause in Wilshire's contract, that's an agent trying to explain away why no club in the EPL has snapped him up.

West Ham signed him over 2 years ago but have literally just paid him to leave, they couldn't even find a club to loan him too. He's been available for months, him being released by West Ham didn't come as a surprise to him or his agent, clubs have known he's been available for a while. I accept at one time he was a very talented player, but it's difficult to judge if he still is as he's played so little football. Clearly West Ham don't think he is. Gerrard strikes me as being something of a taskmaster, demanding in terms of application and attitude as well as ability. We'll just have to wait and see if whether Wilshire has any of those attributes these days.

"I don't think it affected the result, if my memory is right." ?? Many, many moons ago I was gainfully employed in what was then the Clydeway Industrial Centre, these days, post gentrification it's The Skypark. It had a very different look and feel in the 80s, it was owned by Glasgow Council then and housed mainly light industrial companies by day and ladies of the night by, err, night. On the ground floor was a business who I think were called Heatwise. At a time of mass unemployment they employed a lot of guys who were long term unemployed. The idea was they got used to working again and perhaps learned some new skills. It was quite worthy and a decent idea on paper. In reality it had a load of guys who had to go there for a few months are they'd lose their broo, so motivation and application wasn't always what it might have been. Anderson Primary School was alongside and it had a red blaes pitch, on those rare warm Glasgow days the lads from Heatwise would head down to the pitch for a kickabout of a lunchtime. Around this time the Provisional IRA were fairly active with bombings, and one sunny lunchtime the building's alarm went off and the building was cleared as fire engines and Strathclyde's finest descended on the building and a full search was carried out. We were outside for well over an hour before it was deemed a false alarm. A few days later the same thing happened, again, strangely it was a warm day and again squad cars and firemen rushed to the scene. This happened another 3 times over the next month and even the most work shy of us was starting to get a bit hacked off. On the final occasion this happened a large polis and senior fireman asked the crowd gathering outside in the muster area who among us worked for Heatwise. A couple raised their hands and further fingers were pointed towards the football pitch where the main body of the workforce were furiously engaged in what looked like a full scale 11 a side match. The copper marched onto the pitch, picked up the ball and told them they had to go into the building to help with the search for the 'bomb'. He marched them all into the building, came back out and told us we could all go back in too now. Strangely, there were no more bomb scares after that. I wonder if James Joseph Doherty's dad worked at Heatwise...

I've was told a while ago that Wiltshire's lifestyle issues are fairly acute and injuries were used to cover up for lengthy absences caused by other reasons. The fact no one in England signed him tells its own story.

“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.” James Baldwin.

Celtic's clamour for supporter's to be allowed back is eye-catching. I'm not sure allowing say 10,000 back into a 60,000 seat stadium would enhance the atmosphere much, so this can only be about the money. Celtic promised their season ticket holders exclusive access to Celtic matches being shown on their in-house TV. Unlike Rangers, where anyone can purchase on a match to match basis, currently the casual Celtic supporter, or supporter of whoever they're playing, can't. People who claim to know about these things tell me this has been quite successful for Rangers from a revenue perspective. Perhaps Celtic need to allow some fans in so they can break their agreement with their own season ticket holders. Surely getting those in power to allow supporters to return is beyond even their lobbying skills??

It's going to be be increasingly difficult to hang onto our better kids. The money and facilities on offer down south plus the lack of young players establishing themselves in our first team will only lead to more of our 'in-demand' players leaving. Us attracting young players from Ross County and Glentoran is exactly the same, just on a lower level. All that said there still seems to be little correlation between being a fantastic prospect at 16 or 17 and becoming a top level professional, no matter what Scottish side you're at. Believe it or not, at one time the most sought after young player in Scotland was Michael Stewart, an outstanding youth player he was eventually wooed by Man Utd, at that time one of the best club sides in the world with a great record of developing talent, but he had his choice of clubs to sign for. 6 years later he's playing trial matches unsuccessfully trying to get a contract with us. I wish the lad Mebude well, but I don't blame him for leaving and I'm not sure it matters much anymore.

This is rather nice, hopefully it will remain vandalism free by those incensed by seeing our name. Walter Tull honoured on Glasgow post box

It sums up Scottish football. The guy who carried out the challenge suffers no repercussions, Gerrard goes up in front of the beaks. They're not even trying to hide it.

I'd prefer Split but either will be a big step up and easily our hardest game of the season to date. I was speaking to a Dutch pal last night about Willem II and he was pretty dismissive of them. He said they usually fight relegation and no one could understand why they did okay last season. He said they're a good team without any stars, stronger than the some of their parts but if both teams play to their best we'd beat them. He's a season ticket holder at NEC Nijmegen but travels around Europe a couple of times a year going to see different matches. He's desperate to see a Rangers/Celtic match and has 3 times asked me if I could get tickets for him and 6 of his mates! He doesn't believe me when I tell him Steven Gerrard probably couldn't get him 7 tickets, far less me.

Can't we be drawn against Standard or APOEL's opponents if they lose their ties DMAA? Playing Spurs in a one-off match would be fun. They'd, rightly, be favourites, but they're not in great form and the Scotland/England thing levels the field a bit. How are Aberdeen seeded and we're not? There was talk on the radio last night that Sporting Lisbon have a Covid outbreak in their squad and might struggle to put out a team against Aberdeen. That might just have been wishful thinking from the heavily Aberdeen influenced presenters and pundits of course.

Great work guys, bravo.

How the mighty have fallen. I'm sure they'll find their niche...

As well as being a fantastic player he comes across as a pretty decent human being too. What an acheivement that is for any player, but somehow it seems more admirable when it's playing for a country for who simply qualifying for a tournament represents a major success. They've had some fantastic results during his time playing, and he's been integral to many of them. I think Davis might be the Rangers manager one day.

Can I just check, are the Glasgow police against us now too? I know the media, politicians, civic society, those in the arts and junior and senior judiciary are actively plotting our demise but I hadn't realised the police were also part of this cabal as well. This might come as news to the couple of coppers I know. Again, I think it's a big jump from hastily scratching obscenities onto a car to setting it on fire.

To be completely honest my first reaction to this news was 'what's McGregor been up to'. I don't know where McGregor lives but I'm going to assume it's one of the city's more affluent suburbs, where you'd expect the chance of passing neds happening upon his car opportunistically is less likely. Plus it's quite the escalation from shouting stuff at him or his house or even scratching or vandalising his car to torching it. That's premeditated, that's someone arriving with the necessary tools to carry it out and the means of escape at the ready, because torching the car is going to wake everyone in the street up. Plus, why McGregor? I'm not aware of any special animosity towards him other than the usual dislike all our players get. Morelos or even Gerrard I could see, but McGregor? If this turns out to Celtic supporters targeting him for simply being a Rangers player then that's a serious escalation in bampottery in this city. I hope it's not that, I hope McGregor chatted up the wrong guy's bird in a bar, or cut up the wrong guy at the lights.

Guy's like Stewart aren't actually BBC employees, they're freelancers, so this is unlikely to make much difference to this particular parcel of rogues. With a large majority Tory government and a new BBC Chairman due soon, appointed by said Tory government, a move to the right and a reducing of budgets seems likely at the BBC. As ever though I expect the goings on of a regional sports department won't be high up on any new Chairman or DG's agenda. Keep up the good work 26th, always an entertaining read.

I like Borna and he's developed into a more influential player over the last 12 months, but I wouldn't be totally opposed to selling him. He's had a funny career. He had a 'big' move from Osijek to Zagreb earlier in his career and it didn't work out for him, he barely played for them. He stepped back to his home town club, Osijek, again and caught our eye in the matches against us in Europe. He looked really good and I was delighted when we bought him. But he struggled to make an impression at first, perhaps the change of country, language and culture coupled with injuries but it was really last season before he became a first choice. It wasn't that long ago people were suggesting Flanagan or even Halliday start before him. £8 million is a decent profit on him too, he's 27 and in his prime so if we could get £10 million to be honest I'd take it. Surely we can find another left back good enough for the SPFL for a quarter of that.

Aye, that's a fair point, although there would be some TV money I suspect, but nothing like the occasion it would be under normal circumstances. Although a trip to Ibrox would be significantly less expensive for them than a trip to the continent I suspect you're right and they'd prefer to play us under more normal circumstances. From our perspective though it's a short trip if we're away and we'd be massive favourites to win, significantly less tricky than a trip to Bosnia.

Is it still a one off game or will it go to 2 legs? Hope we draw Coleraine, who had a brilliant result last night. I used to work with a guy who was a director of Coleraine, he was a big blue nose too.

Giving this a bump, it deserves a read and you never know who might have a connection.

I was lucky enough to be given a copy of a new book titled The 50 Greatest Rangers Games by Martyn Ramsay. This is my review of it. We all have a favourite Rangers match, or at least a handful that standout above all the others, but I’m not sure I could rank my top 50 and certainly not in order of importance. So I approached this book with a mix of trepidation and excitement. In a recent edition of When Saturday Comes magazine, the writer, Taylor Parks, talks about the 3 ages of football supporting. The last age is nostalgia; always looking back, comparing everything new to what’s been before. That’s the age I now inhabit. The book ’50 Greatest Rangers Games’, by Martyn Ramsay, is a sepia hued, blue-nose nostalgia-fest, that skilfully avoids rose-tinting the past, while celebrating the seasons, matches, moments and people who have shaped our club and our relationship with it. The premise is simple enough. Ramsay, who is involved in The Time Capsule on the Heart & Hand podcast, asked listeners to select their ten greatest Rangers matches in order of preference. From that a top 50 was created out of over 170 matches suggested. It’s democracy in action and like all democratic decisions it will have its dissenters. Ramsay is self-aware enough to say that this isn’t the definitive list, indeed I’m not sure even he fully agrees with all the matches chosen. It’s certainly not my top 50 and probably not yours either, but it is a wonderful collection of matches from our foundation right up to relatively recently. One of the more enjoyable aspects of these type of lists is disagreeing with them. Announcing to my startled family my incredulity that the Glasgow Cup Final of 1986 is missing, the match where Souness first showed me what could be possible, or why 3 European Finals make it but the other one doesn’t. Then you remember that this isn’t the author’s top 50, this is democracy’s, and, well, democracies don’t always get things right as we know. But I’m being churlish and nit-picking because while you might not agree with every match featured you’ll agree with most of them and you’ll enjoy all of them. Ramsay, wisely, doesn’t regurgitate match reports instead he paints a wider canvas drawing in the context of the game. Most chapters extract a little colour from supporters or players, helping to personalise the occasion. Ramsay even manages to use both Jerry Seinfeld and Albert Camus to aid his description of our first ever match, two great thinkers on one of the most important occasions in sporting history, now that’s inspired. This book isn’t tabloid hackery and it’s not cliche ridden hyperbole hoping to cash in on the blue pound either. The analysis is considered, the context is thoughtful and the overview honest. Not every match was football as poetry, sometimes the occasion was better than the performance and the book doesn’t hide from that. Memory is deceptive mistress. I found myself reading about matches I attended, and thought I recalled vividly, with renewed appreciation. Many of us will easily remember the Gascoignes and the Laudrups but forget that some of the sides Walter Smith wrung performances from were far from laden with superstars. I was astonished to read our bench for the famous Marseille home game in the first ever Champion’s League contained Steven Pressley, Gary McSwegan, David Hagen, Ally Maxwell and a semi-retired Davie Dodds; even I’d have fancied my chances against them as a 5-a-side team. Smith’s teams feature heavily in the top 50, which, as the author recognises, says more about the demographic of his listeners than the 115 or so years that came before Sir Walter’s reign. But I am that demographic and I lapped it up. My unrequited love affair with Ian Durrant was reawakened reading this and it was magical to relive some of his finest moments. There’s a line in the telling of a 1-0 victory over Celtic in 1986; “…amid the usual cacophony of Old Firm heavy metal, Cooper and Durrant managed to produce a moment of pure ballet” that lifts the reader far above the melee. Ramsay has captured not only the essence of that goal but also something deeper, why we, as otherwise normal, sensible middle-aged men and women invest so much of our time, energy and emotion into something that often makes us miserable. Simply, because there are moments that are almost transcendental, and Cooper’s flick and Durrant’s reading of it were that for me. That moment of beauty and joy sit proudly on the credit side of the ledger so often burdened down by financial catastrophe, lower league calamity and signing Ian Black. Many of your heroes are here, although some might be missing. You are reminded just how fortunate we are to support Rangers. Our top 50 contains league titles, domestic and European cup finals and famous victories over other great sides. If the last decade has taught us anything it’s to not take that for granted and to remember it and enjoy it more often. It’s not all victories, there are draws and even losses in this list, a reminder that greatness can be achieved in defeat as well. But Rangers aren’t about defeat, we’re about trophies and this book doesn’t disappoint on that count. The author has evidently done his homework, the amount of research that has clearly gone into every chapter is impressive. For instance I’m not sure I’d ever known that one of the reasons for the banning of the back pass was the amount of time Pat Bonner held the ball during a match at Italia 90. That this indirectly then led to one of our greatest ever victories over Leeds Utd was an interesting insight. Well done Packy! But it’s when writing directly about Rangers that Ramsay excels. It’s not just his study of the matches that shines through, although it does, it’s that this has obviously been a labour of love. There is emotion, warmth, honesty, jubilation, frustration and disappointment in his writing, but most of all there’s love. This isn’t just a book about Rangers, this is a book about a relationship that’s endured for most of his life. Most football supporters will be able to relate to that, but few will be able to express it so well. This book understands football fandom isn’t just about a professional player who is fleetingly wearing a blue jersey and scoring an important goal. It’s about how that makes us feel. Truly great football matches aren’t watched, they’re felt. It’s why I laugh whenever I’m faced with all that ‘new club, Sevco’ gibberish. Only someone who fundamentally doesn’t understand football could think that way. This book understands football. For me, the author has taken these matches and added the soul that's so often missing from written accounts. There’s a paragraph in The 50 Greatest Rangers Games that particularly resonated with me. It comes at the end of his chapter on the 1973 Scottish Cup Final and I’d read it the night before the news of Tom Forsyth’s passing, a match in which he scored a famous winner. Ramsay talks about the connection Rangers creates between generations of the same family and how that shared passion in Rangers allows us to communicate with each other, something we’re not always good at doing. It was a stand out paragraph for me in a book I really enjoyed. I’ll read it again, and I’ll give it to my Dad and to my sons to read too. I encourage you to do the same.

I still think Docherty wasn't given a chance and we need his type of player in some games, last Sunday's being an example. I'd play Docherty over Hagi in that type of match all season long. I noticed Lewis MacLoed, once of this parish, joined Plymouth this week, he joins Ryan Hardie there. He's another that's had a terrible time with injuries.

I'd sell Kent and buy Martin Boyle from Hibs and David Turnbull from Motherwell (I think he's quite good, plus lols). We'd probably still have about £7 million left to spend on people I've not heard of.

Mixing up Linfield and Glentoran doesn't go down well in parts of Belfast! Charlie Lindsay is seen as a real talent in Northern Ireland, he's the youngest player in Glentoran's history to play for their first team. Glentoran would be of a similar standard to Ayr Utd, Dunfermline maybe even a Hamilton type side, mid to upper level Championship club.