Gaffer

I completely understand the frustration. I feel it too. I'm just trying to bring a degree of perspective to this though. Murty has done really well and was (and maybe still is) within touching distance of being a hero. I also agree that he could and should have made subs earlier, or even different ones, however there can Ben no doubt, surely, that the team on the park that day should have beaten Celtic. All I'm saying is that had we won that game, we would not have had this reaction. As I've said many times before, I won't blindly defend anyone, but it seems bizarre that it's now suddenly the board's fault. And even if you thought it was, King is a non executive director. Shouldn't the criticism be aimed at those in executive positions? I do not have the inside 'knowledge' that some others claim to have, but equally I don't blindly believe most of that either. I am however seriously questioning the motives of some people who appear mainly when there is an opportunity to attack our players, our manager, our board, and our club. As for King, my disappointment in him is that he doesn't appear to be able to spend time on our club. I know he's been up front about that and that's he's only stepped in because no one else did, I'd still like a more hands on chairman. King seems to get things done when he's here but that's not very often. I'm also pretty sure from what I've heard that he'd welcome a real supporter with real money to take over from him. The problem is that the length of that queue is the square root of zero. That's why I ask the question .... who could take over? Who would the chairman be and who would the replacement shareholder be?

Murty's record in charge is on a par with Smith, Advocaat, etc. The key difference with them is that although they may have a similar win record, they had more draws and fewer losses. It goes back to something Souness said when he arrived. He said his first job was to solidify the defence because "you don't lose games if you don't lose goals". I'd love to see how Murty gets on with two strong centre backs. I've looked at the goals we've lost this season and all but two of the goals were not just easily preventable, but could and should have been stopped by both centrebacks. In other words, both had the opportunity to stop them either through positioning, marking or tackling. I'm interested to see where McCrorie fits in to this team. If he's playing midfield, that means we only have Bates as a reliable central defender. Alves could be if he was interested, but he looks to have moved on mentally so I'll be astonished if he's not already got his next move sealed already. Martin doesn't look as I feel he's right for us. That means we need three central defenders in the summer to ensure we have backup. We are going to need a whole lot of expertise and luck in the window to secure a partnership that's able to get the flying start we will need. It means the early stages of European competition will be tricky too.

On a separate note, I just read through all the posts and someone implied that the original post came from someone inside Club 1872. Is that correct?

I'll go back to a previously asked question then. Who would you have replace King and the others then? I don't remember a queue of likely suitors when we were in trouble. As for your point about "it's no wonder we lurch from one disaster to another" ..... your hysteria has reached new heights. We've gone from a defeat by Celtic (which was the players' fault), to it being the board's fault, and now apparently it's my fault.

He didn't save Rangers?!? I am clearly confused and I really am serious when I'm asking you now to explain who did? I realise my thanks may have been directed to the wrong people so I'll look forward to being corrected on this point.

It isn't blind obedience at all. All I'm suggesting is that this hysteria has occurred because the team failed to perform as well as they should have and as a result we lost these two games. So, because the team didn't perform, suddenly it's the fault of the board. As far as I can see, the board went after their preferred choice of manager. All seemingly went well until the final stages and he said no (thankfully). They then put trust in Murty and backed him in the January window. We were all (largely) very happy with the transfer business, and then subsequently delighted with the performance of the team. We had the league champions on the ropes and should have finished them off. When the team is performing well and all is good at the club, certain people crawl into the woodwork and await the opportunity to spout the negativity in King's direction. I don't know the man, but I see someone who was willing and able to spend time, money and resources in saving the club. It wasn't that long ago. But now hysteria sets in and some people are wishing he left?!?! Utter hysteria and madness in my opinion. Who pray tell will replace him?

To your first point, no. It doesn't alarm me at all. It appears that he's taken action that he saw fit. It's a private matter for him. To your second point, again no it doesn't concern me at all. King's point was latterly that he doesn't have the funds as it's all within his trust. That's perfectly normal and I don't understand why there's any scaremongering about that. He has to resolve that and is once again a private matter. The board does warrant criticism for appointments, etc, but as I said it would not have been an issue at all had we won last Sunday. The team out there should have won, as I'm sure you'll agree. Had that happened, we would have been joyous with a feeling of great optimism. It just seems that there are people like you with ready to roll headlines anytime something negative happens. What would you have done with your post had we won against them? Would you have merely put in on ice until the inevitable next difficult period arose? I appreciate people reviewing the actions of the board and keeping them honest, but it just seems there are some very unreasonable and hysterical reactions sometimes and I'm suspicious of the motives.

I don't understand what you're saying here. Why should alarm bells be ringing? We gave a young manager the chance (after the 'preferred candidate' thankfully turned us down), and last week we were within touching distance of going within three points of Celtic. Had we won (which we clearly should have if the players had done their jobs properly), we would all have been delighted, so how can the events of the last week now suddenly be the fault of the board? What are you calling for? Banners at Ibrox demanding something? If so, what?

Not so optimistic about the rest of this season, but your post shows why I'm very excited and optimistic about next season. Our home record is worse than abysmal and yet we came within touching distance of a title challenge this season. That's how bad Celtic are!!! We don't need to change much to win 55.

My initial reactions to this game: - We are too sloooooooow when we play at home. It takes over 7 seconds sometimes to switch the play. That's 50% slower than it needs to be at any time, never mind when we are trying to break down well drilled teams. I'm getting sick of seeing this. Please, please, please someone at the club point this out in the analysis. It's beyond s joke now. - Murty could see we weren't breaking them down and didn't appear to change much until we went behind. Bringing on Holt looked like a tactical switch rather than through injury, but I've a,ready said on here how that slows down our attacks because Holt runs with the ball, whereas Goss passes it. I'm not saying Goss was great today, but if it's too slow along the middle, bring in someone else in the middle rather than replace one. Then we can move it quickly through them. Goss, Docherty AND Holt would have been a bettered option. - We desperately need someone to break them down in the middle of the park and we just don't have a player like that. Windass is not a creative number 10. I've been saying it since Pena left, but we miss a player like him (but preferably faster). If we can't play quickly, we need creativity. We don't have it. - Our central defence is terrible and it's so frustrating to see Alves out there. I'd take Cardoso in the team ahead of him. I couldn't tell very well from distance but it looked like Alves just sauntered off the park at the end, whereas Murphy, Docherty and Tav just looked sickened. I prefer to see that they care and Alves doesn't look like he does. - Docherty will turn out to be our most valuable player. He has strength, skill, and more heart than most of the rest of the team. He had a really good game and I was gutted for him as well as us at the end. He gave everything. I'm gutted. Some of the players look sick too, and Murty looked broken. Who knows if he's the right man for the job, but now he needs to really work hard to get them lifted or second place will disappear. Dear Mark Allen, I hope you've identified a number ten and two central defenders for us. We almost have a team capable of winning this league, but these positions are CRITICAL. Cheers

Cummings comes in to replace Morelos so change your predictions where appropriate.

Spot on Frankie, and great preview. This is 5% about the formation and tactics, but 95% about morale and motivation for this game. It's a must win game because it's our next one. If we're up for it, we win.

It's incredible how heated this thread has been at times. It seems that too many people think that they'll convince others to change their way of thinking just by repeating themselves over and over again. It's now bizarre and I think it's the strangest thread ever. We all have our own beliefs, whether they be about religion, politics or football. Having a diverse fan group is NOT a weakness, it's a strength. That is of course unless we spend more time squabbling about the things we completely disagree on, rather than the important things that brought us to this site in the first place - Rangers. We've got a big game coming up and it'd be great if we could get back to discussing that now instead. If we can't agree on politics, can we agree to close this down and get back to important business: - what formation should we use - has Murty done enough to be our manager, and if not what must he do? - what players or positions do we need to bring in the summer? - will Bates return to fitness ahead of the semi final game? id like to read about opinions on that rather than much of the stuff on this thread. Anyone else agree?

I think you've got the right idea there, but the names are the wrong way around.

I'm so pleased our support is allowed to want different things, including independence. I would like you to note that some parties promote the need to spend billions on nuclear weapons. Other parties want us to take major steps to reduce carbon outputs, and thereby hurting many poorer countries. Some parties want us to continue to be ruled by unelected people in Brussels. Some parties want to increase taxes, while others want to reduce them. There are many political policies that will cause our support to vote in different ways, depending on what's importantly to them. I'm not defending the SNP here, but can you tell me a party that does not have members who criticise our club, or any others who display sectarian behaviour? I follow quite a number of politicians on twitter and I think I've seen comments from members of all parties. I've also been known to unfollow one or two that I believe are morons and not worth reading about. I do however tend not to regard everything they say as a party line, rather a personal view. My point is that I don't see any party as good, or party as bad. I'll vote, but sometimes I'm voting for the least worst option rather than one that gives me all the policies I'd like (it doesn't exist). I've voted for most of the parties at one stage or another. However, when it comes to Rangers I'm fully committed no matter what happens. It's further proof that politics and my football club do not mix. One is irrelevant to the other.

Great news for him, and well deserved. What is also very positive is for other players to see that playing for us is a good way for them to break into their national teams and that the SPL isn't seen as a barrier.

It certainly looks that way, but I suspect that the majority of their fans would have required less policing than our own tiny minority of fans who decided that a sinister march was so important on match day. The problem we have is that we can't always easily identify the trouble makers. I fully expect something to change on this and as I've already stated it'll be detrimental to the atmosphere. Pity.

True, but the purpose of the development team isn't to win, it's to improve them as players, and playing with experienced players is always an excellent development opportunity for younger players. I'm hoping it also means we have Wallace back fit again.

The Rangers Observer articles are always entertaining to read, but very often a little erratic in their assessments or conclusions. I sometimes wonder if they write them to attract attention (in a similar fashion to the mainstream media). This one is again interesting to read but full of holes. It ciriticises those who think he should get the job if he has a semi final win because it's short term thinking. It then goes on to say that he dithered to make changes in the old firm game so we need a more experienced manager. Make of that what you will. It suggests that we should take the money we're spending on wages for Hodson, Pena, MOH, Herrera, Nico and Alves and spend it on a manager? Really?!? Wouldn't we be better spending it on better players? It also suggests that Murty has no first team managerial experience. He does of course, but let's assume the writer means "much first team managerial experience". There are hundreds of managers out there with plenty of managerial experience but I wouldn't want many (or any I can think of) of them near our club. Experience doesn't equal success. Learning from experience can be a help though. I'm not suggesting Murty is the man for the job. I've already said he has a lot to prove, but so would any manager coming in to the role. He has made mistakes, as has every other manager. He has however created an exciting style of play, galvanised a dressing room, and put together some good results. Not many managers can do that, and if they do they're snapped up by richer clubs. Unless someone can point me in the direction of a better and less risky option, I'd stick with Murty. He's grown into the role. And as for this article from TRO, if Rangers had beat them at the weekend it wouldn't have been written, so if you are looking for an example of short term thinking, that is it.

I agree with you. "Us" should be Rangers so let's not divide us by bringing politics into it. I think this is the most mental thread I've read since I joined Gersnet and I've realised I'm making it worse by continuing so I'll just sto ....

I might be biased here, but I like to think that Rangers supporting politicians (of which there are many) are smart enough to know that football and politics don't mix and therefore don't talk about it on twitter, etc. There are idiots in all parties. There are Rangers supporters in all parties. There are Celtic supporters in all parties. There are Unionists that have voted SNP (that's why we don't have independence). If we looked at who our support voted for you'd find that it was very representative of the overall votes for parties. Why? Because our support comprises people from many walks of life in this country and beyond. As I've said before, we've got enough problems trying to agree on what our best 11 should be on the park, or who our manager should be. The last thing we need is further divisions by introducing politics into it. Furthermore, politics can be so bloody boring compared to football. Let's get back to the fun and important stuff shall we?!?

Wallace stood by the club through the darker times and I think he deserves some loyalty in return. However, I don't think it makes a lot of difference really. I'd like 11 of them on the park who act like captains, regardless of who has the arm band.

More great news. That's now all of our best players on longer contracts now I believe. The future is bright.

I think this thread just demonstrates why football and politics just shouldn't mix. Whether you understand it, agree with it, or not, the simple fact is that our politics do not determine the team we support and vice versa. For some people, a link is created between the two that just doesn't exist for many others (including me). I've voted for many different parties over the years, depending on their policies. I have however supported the same team since I was old enough to say Rangers. There is nothing connecting the two things for me.

This is a fantastic achievement and milestone, and all credit to what these guys have achieved. Here's to the next 100 and beyond! ?