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'Rangers rudderless as big picture plan threatens to unravel'

tom english - bbc scotland's chief sports writer
·5 min read

In the dog days of early season, after Dynamo Kyiv had put them out of the Champions League and Celtic had put them to the sword in the Premiership, a senior figure at Rangers spoke about the importance of backing Philippe Clement.

The gist was this: Clement had proven himself to be a competent manager in his first season and would get the time he needed to rebuild his team, no matter the heat that came from supporters if things got bumpy on the road, no matter if Celtic won the league this season and next.

There would be no knee-jerk reaction, no continuation of the short-lived spells of Giovanni van Bronckhorst and Michael Beale, no throwing good money after bad in a frenzied pursuit of their city rivals.

As they strived to create a financially self-sufficient club, a functioning player-trading model and a bright new team on the park, they would put their foot on the ball and show patience.

It seemed like an ambitious aim then and it's being put to the test now.

The calm and composed Clement of his first 10 league games last season - nine wins and one draw, largely on the back of six goals for the departed Abdallah Sima and six penalties from the diminished James Tavernier - has been replaced by an altogether different character after 10 league games of this season. Six wins, three defeats and one draw and the authority of before has gone.

Rangers are not just nine points behind Celtic, they are nine points behind Aberdeen and only three ahead of Motherwell.

To put that into context, Beale was seven points behind Celtic when he got bulleted a year ago, Van Bronckhorst was nine points behind Celtic when he was sacked and dear old Pedro Caixinha was eight points behind Celtic and five behind Aberdeen when his bizarre reign ended.

Caixinha exited after 10 games of the 2017-18 season with 18 league points on the board. Clement, despite all the money spent, has only got 19.

Huge semi-final at Hampden

And now he's got Sunday’s League Cup semi-final to contend with. Stuart Kettlewell is doing an outstanding job as Motherwell manager and has them in the top four.

Clement has faced Kettlewell three times; a 2-0 win, a 2-1 win and a 2-1 loss.

This promises to be close again. Motherwell will not fear this Rangers team. They will try to exploit the physical and mental weakness that's becoming more obvious by the week.

Rangers folk were enraged by Wednesday's loss at Pittodrie. If they don't see off Motherwell then the toxicity is going to hit a new high.

Clement was previously praised for his strength, but in the wake of that defeat against Aberdeen, he came across as weak and excuse-making.

It takes a lot to unite fans of both of these clubs - at the point of a bayonet they'd argue over what day of the week it is - but Clement’s interpretation of what went on at Pittodrie brought them together. It was wildly off-beam.

Rangers fans were almost as incensed at his words as they were at the misdeeds of their players. On live television, former Ibrox striker Kris Boyd nearly had a coronary.

It's easy to question Clement's life expectancy in the job now while at the same time having a measure of sympathy for him. Rangers are failing on all fronts, not just on specific match days. Clement’s face sits in the bullseye, but he can't be the only target when so much is going wrong at Ibrox.

There's still no permanent chairman and no chief executive. Other vitally important roles are sitting vacant. Their latest financial returns show a £17.2m net loss off record revenues of £88.3m.

The lack of Champions League loot, again, will have what they call a "significant impact". They are still reliant on soft loans from supportive directors.

Bar the occasional appearance from interim chairman, John Gilligan, Clement has been front of house, a human punchbag for all the ills of Ibrox.

Where are the leaders at Ibrox?

Recruitment has been suspect for years. Some of that was on Clement's watch. Much of it was not.

This is what Rangers have spent more than £40m on in transfer fees (not to mind enormous wages) in recent seasons - Ridvan Yilmaz, Ben Davies, Rabbi Matondo, Nicolas Raskin, Sam Lammers, Cyriel Dessers, Danilo, Jose Cifuentes, Mohamed Diomande, Nedim Bajrami, Robin Propper and Hamza Igamane.

Lammers has left, others are out on loan, a few who are still there are unconvincing, a few spend their days in the treatment room and others have just recently arrived.

Clement calls it a project - and it is - but there's no sense that these guys are the right guys for the project and there's a rapidly growing concern about the manager and his suitability for the job too.

Aberdeen is also a project under Jimmy Thelin, but they're having the greatest start to a season in their entire history. Seven of the players who got game-time on Wednesday arrived in the summer.

The revolution that Thelin has sparked at Pittodrie shows up the emptiness of Clement's words about the misfortune his team has experienced (weirdly, he seems to think offside goals constitute bad luck) and the large number of young players he has in his squad and the cut in the wage bill he has had to endure. The sound of the world's smallest violin could be heard in the background when he spoke.

Things will be unpleasant at Rangers right now and in times like these you need strong people to take charge. Who are the leaders? Who are the ones taking responsibility and setting standards?

Much has changed since that senior figure spoke in a calm and measured way about big picture views and building something substantial over time. As Rangers people run around with their hair on fire, those words appear more plaintive than ever.