weebluedevil

Were we right to cut Celtics allocation at Ibrox? Does a tiny away support disadvantage us more when we play at Parkhead than it will disadvantage them when they play at Ibrox? Or does it make no difference? Does it diminish the global spectacle that is one of the biggest derbies in the world? Question from the wee blue devil.

I agree 100%. I hope we can come to an arrangement to reverse this. It lacks the right atmosphere for an old firm game, but more importantly we had no way of making ourselves heard - especially against them our players could really have been lifted with a stronger support.

He fills you with confidence doesn’t he? Just think how the players must feel when he talks to them, no wonder we’re getting th best out of them. I’m sure he’s raging with AM, but never shows it, totally cool, calm and collected and keeps private discussions and thought about players to himself. It’s the way it should be.

When though? I get why you would take the leniency, softly softly approach particularly with Alfredo, but if he does it again and drops us points, will you still be so ‘forgiving’? Hi team mates certainly wouldn’t be.

If we win on Sunday, there’ll be a few 55 tattoos inked before Sunday evening!

So what you’re saying is that he’s gone from Jekyll and Hyde to Frankenstein! ?

When I originally posed the question, I wouldn’t have been delighted with anything less than a win, but as I said I could accept a draw and stay undefeated. After tonight’s effort, I would be absolutely delighted with a draw. Also listening to DE on the Heart and Hand podcast, he made a good comment about going easy on the team if we lose on Sunday. I think we could forgive that after tonight, absolutely. We still play them 3 more times and we’ll have our chances this season. ‘Anyway, I’m still ?predicting a win!

I’d give Morelos one last chance. As much as I like him for his strength, hold up play and finishing from close range, he’s still not really there in terms of timing his runs to stay on-side and isn’t a natural goal scorer from further out or one on one with the goalie. However, he works hard, can sometimes create a goals from nothing and causes defenses problems. But if he continues to act like a spoilt wee kid then he threatens the team spirit that has been created and will eventually be resented by his team mates. They got him out of jail tonight. If I was SG, I’d be telling him that he does it again and he’s out. We can’t afford to take the risk. I’d also be tempted to drop him on Sunday, but I really want him to score against them and I think we need him. But it’s a close call tbh, because Laff could also do a job against them.

Santa is Turkish, so no problem!

That feels like a loss for me today. Conceding three goals was never in the script, but I guess we came up against our biggest test so far this season. I don’t accept excuses of fatigue - If we want to compete on three fronts we need to be as fit as we all thought we were. I don’t know what went wrong in the 2nd half, we were completely controlled and the equalizer was 100% coming - clear for all to see, yet we couldn’t prevent it. Okay, if we were going to have one off day in these 3 big games, I’d rather it happened today. Let’s see what SG and his team can now do to recover from this. I didn’t think the defence played like their lives depended on it, which I has been characteristic of us so far. No fingers pointed - several players didn’t do themselves justice today. Win, lose or draw on Thursday, I don’t care, as long as we make it to the groups stages, from a revenue perspective. But the league is where we will be judged and we now need to take something from the next Sunday otherwise we could slip 7 points behind Hearts and 5 points behind Celtic after only 4 games, and whatever way you look at it that would not represent a great start.

I was reading some of the journalists giving their views on whether Rangers fans confidence in a result against Celtic, arguably our biggest test this season, was warranted. They felt that our supporters would be delighted to come away with a point. Not for me. Acceptable perhaps, but I won’t be delighted. One draw already at Aberdee, albeit robbed of the opportunity to kick the season off with a win, means we need to come away with 3 points in our next two games if we don’t want to fall further behind the leading pack. We may still be ahead of Celtic if we share the points (assuming we take care of business tomorrow), but that game is the big test for us, and with Celtic not looking their strongest at the moment I would be disappointed not to win there, especially as Hearts have shown they can be taken. A draw won’t be the end of the world, far from it, but I’m not going to celebrate a draw at this stage.

You’re the first, the last, my everything.

The SG effect!

Ufa return leg has to be the priority, but I think we do have strength in depth with the notable exception of CB, so I think we can cope with these 3 massive games coming up. As others have said, I think one good reason to rotate out Morelos and/or Jack for the Well game is for fear of a sending off and suspension for the Celtic game. I still don’t trust those two not to react when provoked, especially Alfredo.

Doesn’t mean a word of that poor attempt at an apology, that he was clearly instructed to do by Motherwell’s lawyer, imo. Needs a ban for his disgraceful comments. Let’s hope we obliterate these morons on Sunday!

I think we’ve just done enough thanks to the clean sheet. Thought Ufa had a great defensive performance and we just weren’t able to find any space or time to spark something in the final third. Great periods of possession in the second half but lacked that killer final pass. On the plus side they didn’t cause our defense any problems with very little to offer when they tried to counter. If we score one over there I’m confident we go through, but it does change the game plan next week. I think we now have to search for that away goal rather than just keep the back door locked like we did in Maribor. Some positive performances - Ejaria had his best game for us yet with good hold up play, passing and stealing. Jack was composed again and Candeias’s work rate was superb - he was everywhere, so somewhat surprised that he was subbed tbh. Morelos again very strong performance and could have had a couple himself. Greegsy, what can you say? Another fine stop she needed. The ball didn’t bounce for us kindly tonight not helped the atrocious refereeing, but clearly we are in pole position. Not getting the run of the ball or fair share of good refereeing decisions yet come away with a win and clean sheet gives me great confidence for next week.

First time that I’ve listened to the GN Pod and thought it was a fantastic listen. Well done to all the contributors and editors!

Yep , really gutted about the kick-off time, and can’t really afford the time off, so will be RTV on iPhone propped up against my monitor.

Autocorrect on breasts from the east, but works just as well

Of course, totally understand, and whilst we are all drinking the SG coolaid, there’s an apprehension with most of the fans that they don’t want to get too confident in case we end up let down or disappointed - it’s the false dawn mentality. My theory is that we’ll feel that way if things don’t go to plan anyway, if we lose a game...or two...on the trot. So I’m just going with the momentum that we’ve created - I hate being too pessimistic, so I’m all in, and if we do have a blip then we get up and go again. Keeping the positivity and confidence annoys those breast’s from the east in any case so that a good reason alone! Let’s go!!!!!!!!!

Seems likely, but I also wouldn’t be surprised if Stevie G plays him upfront with Morelos to try to secure a good margin of victory and take the pressure off the return leg, especially since we have arguably our biggest test 3 days after that return leg. The good thing with our manager is he is comfortable playing different formations depending on the task and opposition. Having said that, it may be too soon to test that out in what would be KLs debut.

I was underwhelmed at first, I hope he keeps knocking them in against Celtic and proves me wrong. Welcome back Kyle!

Fair comment!

Very true!

I think the board need to make a punt prior to getting to the group stage as our 2nd leg of the play-off is 24 hrs before the window shuts. Based on what they’ve seen so far, they need to gamble on the fact we will make the group stage.