The Old Firm - More Questions Than Answers

I LANG SYNE bought into the late, great, Ian Archer's theory that football was the 20th (now 21st) century example of clan warfare; and that warfare is never more extreme than when the two parts of that single clan: the Old Firm, clash.

Four days on from Sunday afternoon's events at Ibrox, the dust has still not settled. It would be wrong to say few of us saw that one coming - with Old Firm games, it never does to expect the expected, the old fixture's capacity to surprise remains unaffected by the length of the rivalry. Sure, Rangers won, but that victory will only delay the inevitable - Celtic will still be crowned SPL Champions, season 2011-2012, while Rangers' future will remain in doubt for a few weeks or months yet.

Their win should leave Ally McCoist asking one question of his players - Where have you been since October? The other questions to be asked of Rangers have been being asked for some weeks now, since the slide into administration.

Rather more questions should be being tabled across the city. Why is it Celtic's form dips when the game really matters. They are a wee bit like Andy Murray - they can put together a run of victories against diddy opponents, but, when the result really, really matters - as in the League Cup Final, or the Old Firm match - why do they tense-up so and struggle?

Might it have something to do with their manager's personality? Say what you like about Neil Lennon, he is his own man. He has built-up a "no one likes us - we don't care" mind set inside Lennoxtown; this plays well with those in the Celtic family who, in spite of the massive strides so many of the club's followers have taken in all aspects of Scottish life, still like to see themselves as the Irish outsiders, despised by the rest of Scotland.

But, maybe a wee bit less: "us against the world" and a bit more: "We Are The People" might play better. Just a thought mind you.

Then there is the big question for the Celtic Family - just what do they do about Neil Lennon?

I admire his refusal to trim his sails, to be less-confrontational. That says, he ought, perhaps, to chose his causes with a bit more care. Sure, he didn't think the two red cards his players got at Ibrox were justified - but it is indeed rare for a manager at the top end to admit a red card to any of his players were justified - lest they be absolute stone-wallers, whereupon the manager will find plenty of mitigating factors.

However, Law Five cannot be more clear: "The referee is the sole judge of fact". In a clear and provable case of mistaken identity - the red card will be rescinded, otherwise, it takes the help of a good lawyer to rescind the card, but, the clock is not wound back to the point of dismissal, the player returned to the game and the match finished. So, Lennon ought to know by know, having a go at the referee at half time does no good.

Calling a referee's decision "criminal" after the match does no good, while doubting the capabilities of an official, even before a game is played, is just plain stupid. Is there nobody inside Celtic Park who can sit-in on Lennon's interviews and save the manager from himself? He is now being seen as a serial offender when it comes to comments about referees and decisions and the SFA will surely despatch him to the stand for a long time to come.

Actually, a season-long touchline ban might be no bad thing for manager and club. From the stand, he would have a better view of the game and might be better able to make changes, which he could then have passed on to the players by his assistants, while not putting his own participation in doubt by removing himself from the firing line. Generals long ago stopped leading from the front; if football is indeed: "war without bullets" maybe it is time for football's generals to view proceedings from higher ground.

I SELDOM comment on other blogs, but, my old mate David Leggat, in his blog 'Leggoland' is, I feel, doing himself no favours. We in the hack pack have long been aware of Leggo's Rangers leanings; he might not be RWM of Lodge 1690, the Lap Top Loyal, but he is an extremely-long-serving member.

Leggo sees pro-Celtic conspiracies everywhere, but right now, he is, I feel, and as a long-standing pal of his I ought to caution him - barking up the wrong tree in his warnings concerning the involvement of "Celtic's lawyers" the Glasgow firm of Harper McLeod in current Scottish footballing issues.

The Chairman of Harper McLeod is Professor Lorne Crerar, an old boy of Glasgow High School, a former top rugby referee and the man to whom, when there is a ticklish issue erupts in world rugby, the IRB, SRU or any of the leading governing bodies of world rugby, turns.

Professor Crerar and his team know their sport and sports laws - their integrity and fairness is beyond question and to cast dubts about this, purely because they are "Celtic's lawyers" does Leggo no favours.

Puberty Hits The SPL

THERE may well be an element of joining-in to administer a kicking to Rangers, while they are on the floor, about it - but, I welcome the sudden onset of puberty among the "Tiny Ten" SPL clubs other than the Bigot Brothers.

Suddenly they have grown a pair as they seek a fairer voting system on SPL matters - not before time. The SPL rules have always been skewed towards keeping Billy and Timmy sweet and, frankly, that's not how leagues work.

I have said before and perhaps if I repeat it often enough, the message will get through to even the thickest of the Celtic Family: but, if Rangers do go under, Celtic will be, at least in the short term, able to totally dominate Scottish football - on the park. But, in the corridors of power, they will be weakened. When push comes to shove, the Old Firm will always stick together - without Rangers, Celtic will have nobody on whom they can depend to back them when the arguments start.

Also, the arrogance, the need to set the agenda and have his way which many of us have detected as the Lawwell way of working, has won Celtic few friends - as Rangers have grown weaker, Mr Lawwell has become the big bad bully of Scottish football, and like all bullies, he will fall once the ones he has bullied start sticking together - and that has started to happen this week.

BY THE WAY - what's this strange silence from Vincent the Vengeful - the SFA's Compliance Officer? Last Sunday - five days ago - in his post-match press conference following the League Cup Final, Neil Lennon (again) let himself down badly with a petulant and ill-considered rant about referee Willie Collum denying what Lennon and the entire Celtic Family saw as a clear penalty, then, in the opinion of Lenny and the Legions, compounding his folly by booking Anthony Stokes.

Lenny dubbed the decision "criminal" - but, as yet, five days on, no action from our Vinny. Strange indeed. You'd have thought such a clear violation of the standards of sportsmanship which the SFA expects of those under its control would have landed Lenny with an invitation, at the very least, to turn-up at Hampden to explain himself.

Or is it, as some of my media friends in the so-called "Lap Top Loyal" have suggested - further proof that in 2012 Scottish football, there is one law for Celtic, another for everyone else.

As I have said before, if all those years of supposed "masonic conspiracies" and special treatment for Rangers was wrong - then special treatment for Celtic has to be equally wrong.

A WEE parting thought for today. As I understand it, one of the fundamental core beliefs of the Jehovah's Witnesses is that, come Armageddon, only they will be saved - they are, if you like - God's chosen people (and I suppose they might have to fight the Jews for that one).

So, JW Brian Kennedy buying Rangers might be a good fit - after all, in spite of the way they have been let down over the past 50 years by Unionist politicians, the owners of Scotland's metal-bashing industries, Sir David Murray, Craig Whyte and sundry others - the ordinary Rangers fans continue to insist We Are The People - in other words - the chosen people.

I look forward to seeing Ally McCoist trying to get money for new players out of Gordon McKie - the man likely to be Kennedy's Chief Executive, should he win control of Rangers.

Another Famous Belgian Surfaces

I MISSED the 1997 celebrations, so there was no way I wasn't going to be out on John Finnie Street last night to watch Kilmarnock parade the League Cup, following their win over Celtic.

 

I had a feeling, watching the game, as Celtic scorned chance after chance - or to be more-correct, Cammy Bell made save after save, that their failure to convert even one of the many chances they had created would come back to haunt them, and, so it proved. If the hoary old pub quiz chestnut: Name five famous Belgians is ever again posed in a Killie pub - there's no way Dieter Van Tornhout's name isn't in there alongside those of Jean Claud Van Damme, Jean Marc Bosman, Tintin and Hercule Poirot.

 

Of course, the death of Liam Kelly's father, Jack, cast a pall over the celebrations, what a tragedy for the family.

 

Another cloud arrived with Neil Lennon's post-match remarks about the penalty which Willie Collum chose not to give when Anthony Stokes went down in the Killie box. It is through such press comments that Lennon, a highly-intelligent and able manager, let's himself down and enhances his image as a right wee ynaff with no breeding or dignity.

 

I don't doubt, in similar circumstances, the likes of Jock Stein or Billy McNeill felt equally angry and annoyed, but, they had the good sense to keep such opinions to themselves, and to hide behind platitudes - before retiring to the depths of Parkhead to properly vent their rage. Maybe wee Neil's just too honest, too emotional; on the other hand, maybe he really is a wee ynaff - but, somebody inside Celtic really has to take him in hand.

 

As for Willie Collum, ok, he made the call as he saw it. I must say, I've seen such tangles result in penalties, I've seen other occasions on which they weren't given. However, Neil Lennon and the entire Celtic family MUST realise: THE REFEREE IS THE SOLE JUDGE OF FACT - if he says it's not a penalty, it isn't, accept it, deal with it and move on. In any case, given the day Bell was having, I reckon had the penalty been given, he'd have saved it. However, to return to Collum - everyone known he is a Roman Catholic, therefore, by definition, we expect him to be "Celtic-minded". I have no knowledge whether or not he is.

 

However, might it be, given he knows he is because of his religion, expected to favour Celtic, he sub-consciously tries to not be seen to favour the club. I suspect, the same problem besets top Scottish rugby referee Andrew MacPherson, who seems to reserve his very-occasional off days for matches involving his home-town club, Ayr.

 

Given the way things have been going in Scottish football this season, I expect Stokes will have the "diving" yellow card rescinded by the Review Body, while Lennon's outrageous post-game rant will similarly be down-played.

 

Any way, it's good, after weeks of financial matters anent Rangers hogging the headlines, it's good to get back to proper football matters taking priority.

 

 

 

ABOUT Rangers, by the way - I note, with the off-field story settling down, some people are now starting to ask questions about Ally McCoist's managerial ability, or lack of the same.

 

Of course, managing Rangers, a huge job at the best of times, has been made harder by all the administration nonsense. But, the way the club is leaking points, Ally isn't exactly setting the heather on fire. In fact, his managerial career has started rather as his playing career did - at a very low level. However, if it picks-up the way his playing one did, McCoist the manager might, in the long term, prove to be just as big a man for Rangers as McCoist the player was.

Klingons On The Starboard Bow

IT HAS long been understood by professional crash investigators, whether looking into the causes of disasters on road, rail, at sea or in the air - that there is very seldom a single cause of a crash. Received wisdom is that lots of seemingly irrelevant small cogs somehow mesh together until the big bang - call it the chaos theory if you like.

Right now, we in Scotland are somehow obsessed by the on-going drama surrounding Rangers,and here I will spare you a re-hash of the many small incidents which have come together to imperil the Scottish football establishment club.

However, might I suggest that Rangers' problems might be but a single component in the lead-up to a bigger potential disaster - the end of Scottish (indeed British) football as we know it.

Celtic-minded he may be, but professional Oirishman Phil Mac Giolla Bhain has been consistently nearer the money on matters surrounding Rangers than most (even if his obvious relish at that club's problems is extreme schadenfreude), the rangerstaxcase website, again overseen by someone with Celtic sympathies, has also been a far-truer source of information than anywhere else. Yesterday PMGB suggested the issues which have surfaced over the past month or so, and in particular the way the SFA's and SPL's (non) governance and control of Rangers' affairs have allowed the crisis to deepen, demand that there be an independent Scottish government inquiry into not merely the Rangers affair, but also, the SFA's whole conduct of football.

That's one strand.

Elsewhere Sir David Richards, one of the top, if not the main man in English football, came up with a wonderfully over-the-top rant at FIFA and UEFA, accusing both bodies of "stealing" football from the English, who, in his view, ought to still be running the game on a global basis. Richards then compounded his folly by exiting, stage left, hurriedly, from a conference in Qatar, falling into an ornamental fountain and having to be led away, dripping and humiliated, by another FA "blazer".

That's a second strand. (Funny how, 65-years after home rule for India and the partition  of Pakistan marked the end of the British Empire, some Englishmen still think they ought to rule the world).

A motion has been tabled for the next big FIFA get-together, calling for the four Home Nations to lose their automatic right to nominate one of the FIFA vice presidents.

That's a third strand.

The Westminster government is also looking into the cosy arrangement whereby the English Premiership, (in the person of Richards) has a senior place on the FA governing board - this, seemingly, is a conflict of interest. The same accusation, by the way, could be made about the SFA and the SPL.

That's a fourth strand.

Then there is the continuing case of 'Team GB' playing in the football competition in this year's London Olympiad, and the repercussions thereoff. As I have said before, often and loudly, this single issue, which has been grossly, incompetently, mis-handled by the FA and BOA in particular, but with outstanding assistance from the three "Celtic" associations, the FAW, IFA and SFA, may yet lead to the disbanding of all four and the formation of a new UKFA - which means no more English, Northern Irish, Scottish or Welsh international teams.

That's the fifth strand.

If Sepp Blatter and his minions at FIFA, Michel Platini and his citizens at UEFA, the Westminster and Edinburgh governments all decide, separately, to investigate the FA and the SFA, plus the game's honchos in Belfast and Cardiff - then football as we have known it in these islands is finished.

This might be no bad thing. There are many things wrong with Scottish and British football which need to be put right.

It's just, I don't see FIFA, UEFA or the British political and civil administration classes as being the guys to sort things out properly.

I see a Titanic-style disaster looming on the horizon.

We're awe doomed, doomed ah tell ye.

Milanda and Billy Smart

BREAD and Circuses is a metaphor for one aspect of the fall of the Roman Empire - the way the ruling elite used frivolity and spurious entertainment to mask the decline and fall. B&C might describe the manner in which the industrialised west and in particular the USA and Uk are in decline whilst the likes of Brazil, China and India's stars ascend. Here in the UK - what are Big Brother, X Factor, Britain's Got Talent, the various dancing shows and the general dumbing down of the media but classic instances of B&C?

The on-going Rangers drama is, in many ways, classic bread and circuses. For 25-years we have seen legions of over-hyped, over-paid, often over-the-hill "stars" imported to Ibrox, ceremonially unveiled at lavish media events in the Blue Room, only to disappoint then disappear.

I look back on all those foreign big names brought to Rangers during the Murray Years of excess and I ask: IF (ok right now that's a HUGE if) Rangers emerge from their current malaise and continues towards the bicentenary in 2073, which players from the Murray Years will be mentioned in despatches when Lindsay Herron's grandson sits down to write the bicentennial history?

The McNeill brothers, Tom Vallance, Alan Morton, Davie Meiklejohn, Bob McPhail, Jimmy Simpson, George Young, Willie Woodburn, Willie Waddell, Eric Caldow, Jim Baxter, Willie Henderson, Davie Wilson, John Greig, Davie Cooper, Richard Gough - they will all be in that book (if it is ever written) - but what of Rangers' foreign legions of the last 25-years? Terry Butcher, more than likely, Gazza and Brian Laudrup, definitely; of the rest - not a lot.

Sure, some (the de Boers, Kloss), did great things before their Rangers' service, others (van Bronkhurst), did great things afterwards, but, by and large - basically they took the money and ran.

David Murray spent the money, then handed the club to a crook and limped away (no cheap dig at Sir David's unfortunate lack of legs here btw). As I have said before, he handed the club to a crook, but, while Whyte took the club to disaster, it was headed for the iceberg long before Whyte took the helm.

During the golden years under Bill Struth, Rangers were a CLUB. Yes, Struth was the main man, and while there is a strong likelihood that he was the architect of the 100% Protestant recruitment policy, he set the standards and the tone. He may well have gone on too-long, but, even in his final years of apparent decline - Rangers still won trophies.

Then, in came the era of one-man rule - John Lawrence, Lawrence Marlborough, David Holmes then David Murray. That was when Rangers began to lose their dignity, the aura of We Are The People. The men at the top of the marble staircase began to use the bread and circuses tactics and, just as the Roman and British Empires were brought down by external forces - so the Rangers Empire is teetering on the brink.

If you know your history - you can see it happening.

Another Week Older And No Wiser

A WEEK might be a long time in politics, but it is a comparatively short spell in the history of a 140-year old national institution. What have we learned about Rangers in the past seven days, during which, again, events concerning the ailing club have dominated the Scottish football agenda?

In truth we have learned comparatively little, other than just how big Rangers are in terms of Scotland. Were Celtic, the only other club of anything like similar size in this wee backwater of ours, in similar deep doo-dah, I doubt if the media agenda in Scotland would be so-skewed in favour of covering the on-going and painful saga of what may well be the club's death throes.

Not having a background in business journalism or economics, I am loath to put-in my twopenceworth - to quote General Chaing Kai Sheck on the fall-out from the French Revolution - it's way too early to comment on this.

The Celtic-minded will be shattered when it all ends. They haven't had so-much fun since the summer of 1967. If Rangers as we know the club does have to be liquidated and join the likes of St Bernard's, Third Lanark, Airdrieonians and Gretna as an entry in the history books - this will be another wonderful summer for the happy hoopsters, but I wager, come the end of the year, they will miss their old enemies. When all you have is hatred and the thing you hate is removed, there will be nothing left.

I honestly believe the end of Rangers will not be the end of the world for Scottish football, it will survive. Greater Glasgow has lost John Brown's, Stephen's of Linthouse, Beardmore's, Albion Motors, North British Loco and still flourishes. Motherwell has lost Ravenscraig and life goes on; Coates no longer dominates Paisley, Johnny Walker has walked out on Kilmarnock, following BMK, Glacier Metal, Saxone, Glenfield & Kennedy and others; Volvo came and went from Irvine. In my own wee Ayrshrie back-water, those scant few who went down the pit all their working lives and somehow managed to exceeed their alotted three score years and ten still consider Maggie Thatcher to be two swear words - ignoring the fact this village now produces more coal than it ever did - opencasting being more efficient than deep mining - and life goes on.

Why then should everything stop because Rangers go under?

But let's not forget - right now David Murray is guilty of nothing more than gross mis-management on a grand scale. He has, as yet, broken no laws; the Big tax case might find otherwise, but, until that happens, and there are no guarantees, he is only guilty of being a poor gambler - as his father was before him.

Craig Whyte on the other hand, has been found guilty of nefarious and under-hand conduct in the court of public opinion. Murray's recklessness and failure to face reality took Rangers to the brink - but it was Whyte who took the club over the brink into administration and probably into liquidation.

I feel Messers Murray and King, guilty by association with Murray, are not the men to rescue Rangers, should rescue be possible. What they need is that frightening woman from Country House Rescue. In every episode I have seen, she has had to persuade reluctant owners, striving to save a decaying country pile, to change their ways, accept the unacceptable and really change.

That is what Rangers must do and sadly, thus far in the administration saga, nobody around the club seems willing to do this. Wage cuts of 75% and temporary belt-tightening is all very well, but it will take longer and more-stringent economy measures and a huge amount of effort, to rescue Rangers.

It can still be done, but not I fear by anyone used to the excesses of the Murray years.

When David Murray's father went bust a fantastic young Ayr rugby player named Les McCall was landed with the task of keeping the Murray firm, Murray Forrest alive. Les and his trusty foreman Davie Alexander, worked all the hours God gave them to turn that firm around and make it a success. The reward for both was a far-too-early meeting with their maker.

Somewhere out there, there is a Les McCall who can revive the Rangers, brought down by the mis-management and reckless gambling of the younger Murray, whose legacy is a far-greater shambles of a business than his father lost. I wish him well in his task.

Big Egos = Big Trouble: Time To Get Back To Basics

THIRTY years ago I worked for an upmarket Sunday broadsheet. Like most Sunday titles it had a small core of staffers, who put-in the daily grind keeping the paper on-track. In the sports department this consisted of the Sports Editor (who doubled as the main writer), a couple of talented subs - one of whom who also wrote features and reports - and a general factotum, who did a bit of subbing, but administred the desk brilliantly and was the general trouble-shooter.

I was one of a team of freelances who worked more-or-less exclusively for the paper; they had first call on my services, they, not I, decided which match I would cover on a Saturday, but, if the paper didn't need me or didn't fancy one of my stories, I was free to punt it elsewhere.

On Saturday afternoon, a gang of sub-editors from the publishing group's other titles augmented the core production staff and put out a paper which is still held in high regard by all of us who worked on it.

That paper folded, for various reasons: the timing of its start-up wasn't right; there was a down-turn in advertising; our success actually harmed another far-more-august and much-longer established rival Sunday title owned by the same group, so, after a little over three years - we were history.

However, another facet in that great paper's demise had actually been sown during its start-up. The group which published had recruited some stellar names onto the team of journalists and, in the end, there were maybe too-many chiefs and not enough Indians and it all came crashing down to the sound of discordant egos.

I fear much the same might be said about Rangers at this time. Today as I write, we await the list of player redundancies from the Ibrox club, and there are sure to be some big names on that list.

These will, we expect, include full internationalists who have been paid a handsome weekly retainer, for not actually kicking a ball too-often. Ever since the SPL in their wisdom did away with reserve or Under-21 teams, I have struggled to understand why Rangers or Celtic or Hearts, indeed any of the "super" 12 clubs have needed quite so-many players.

In the cause of research I got out an old copy of Rothman's, for 1972-73. This covered season 1971-72, in which Rangers won their solitary European trophy, the old European Cup-Winner's Cup. The club played 55 games in total that season - 46 domestically in the League, League Cup and Scottish Cup, plus 9 in the Cup-Winners' Cup. They used 20 players: the 11 Barcelona Heroes - Peter McCloy, Sandy Jardine, Willie Mathieson, John Greig, Derek Johnstone, Dave Smith, Tommy McLean, Alfie Conn, Solin Stein, Alex MacDonald and Willie Johnston, plus Jim Denny, Colin Jackson, Ron McKinnon, Graeme Fyfe, Willie Henderson, Andy Penman, Ian McDonald, Alex Miller and Derek Parlane. Add back-up goalkeeper Gerry Neef and you have a 21-man squad.

Sandy Jardine was the only squad member to play for Scotland that season (partly because manager Tommy Docherty was no fan of Rangers) but 8 of the 21 had already been capped, while a further 5 would go on to become full internationalists.

It could be argued that that squad from 40 years ago had greater quality and depth than the bloated 27-man squad which Ally McCoist currently manages. Indeed, if asked to select a composite XI from the two squads, I would pick Allan McGregor ahead of big Peter McCloy in goal and that would be that - the outfield players would all come from the 1971-72 squad.

The point I am perhaps labouring over here is - big names are no guarantee of success. That has long been evident in football - think back to the "Bank of England" Sunderland team of the early 1950s. Sure they had the great Len Shackelton making the bullets for Welsh centre forward Trevor Ford and his Scottish co-striker Charlie "Legs" Fleming, they had George Aitken in midfield, like Fleming a proud Fifer, and a whole host of internationalists elsewhere - but, they finished third in the old English First Division in 1950 (before the buying spree began in earnest), fourth in 1955 and were relegated in 1958.

It is a lot easier, if arguably a longer-term project, to build rather than buy a team and maybe, had Sir David Murray demanded evolution rather than revolution of Messrs Souness and Smith, the spendthrift years of Advocaat might not have happened. Also, perhaps, had he backed Paul Le Guen rather than Barry Ferguson, things might have been better.

Of course, it was the activities (which most right-thinking people I feel deem as criminal) of Craig Whyte which finally tipped Rangers over the edge into administration - and could still lead to liquidation. But, the reckless and ill-judged mis-management of the Murray years took the club to the edge and into the hands of a man whom history will not treat kindly.

Can I offer further evidence of how mis-management has helped cripple Rangers. Since the SPL was formed, 27 young Scottish and 9 young Northern Irishmen playing for the club have won international Under-21 honours. Of these a mere five: Charlie Adam, Chris Burke, Alan Hutton, Allan McGregor and Alan Little have gone on to win full caps with Rangers. Four more: Stephen Hughes, Ross McCormack, Barry Nicholson and Danny Wilson have won intenational honours since leaving Rangers.

Grant Adam, Darren Cole, John Fleck, Scott Gallacher, Kyle Hutton, James Ness, Ross Perry and Greg Wylde - should they survive the administrator's cull, might add to that list.

Tom Brighton, Andy Dowie, David Graham, Steve Lennon, Rory Loy, Scott McLean, Bob Malcolm, Alan Shinnie, Graeme Smith, Steven Smith, Scott Wilson, Scott Carson, Wes Drummond, Ian Feeney, Darren Fitzgerald, Colm Hegarty, Ryan McCann, Paul McKnight and Bryan McLean - where are they now? Although I accept, injury did for Steven Smith.

These 36 players were seen, as they reached their majority as: "the future". That so-few should turn promise into the real deal with the club is an awful condemnation of the coaching and player-management and education of Rangers. And, incidentally, Celtic's record is equally poor.

The Lisbon LIons were all Scottish, only Ronnie Simpson  and Willie Wallace were not brought through the ranks at Celtic Park.

The Barcelona Bears were all Scottish, McCloy, Smith, McLean, Stein and MacDonald were bought-in - Jardine, Mathieson, Greig, Johnstone, Conn and Johnston came through the ranks.

Both of these squads were well-coached, they were native Scots and knew the ethos of the clubs they played for. Maybe, had Rangers stayed true to their Scottish roots they would not be in the state they now are - and don't think Celtic are all that safe from the potential hazards of running a big squad which is too-rich and too-needful of better surroundings than that in which they currently operate.

If Rangers are to survive and restore past glories, they have to get back to basics (but, that doesn't include sectarianism).