A Summer of Hope
It's been a while since I had the chance to sit down and write, between the craziness of Seville and family life it's been manic. It's not just that though, I wanted to stop and take stock of the season and my hopes for the future.
2021/22
I don't think I'm speaking out of turn when I say it was disappointing to finish the season with only one piece of silverware. If you had told me at the start of the season we'd be 6 points clear at Christmas, we'd face Hibs in the Semi-Final of the League Cup, we'd face Frankfurt in the Final of the Europa League and we'd face Hearts in the Final of the Scottish Cup I would have had numerous thoughts:
- We'd end up with at least a double, if not a treble, and dare I say it a quadruple
- How on earth has Gerrad led us to so many finals in one season (tongue in cheek)
- Are you insane saying we'd be in the final of the Europa League?
That being said, there may be initial disappointment that we didn't win more, but we shouldn't let that detract from how well the team has played this season. They took us right to the final kick of the Europa League. This, despite what fans of lesser teams may say, is a massive achievement. European football isn't designed for a team like us to make a major final, and while it would have been unbelievable to win it, the team and the manager still deserve a lot of credit for the run.
It was also great to finally bring the Scottish Cup back to Ibrox for the first time since the 2008-09 season. It was also something the players and backroom staff deserved. If they had ended such a hard-fought season without any silverware it would have been a travesty for them.
My only regret about the Scottish Cup is that I was unable to go to the game. Due to the travel time and cost of going to games for myself, I traded going to Hampden so that I could go to Seville, and as a result, I missed seeing the club lift the trophy in person.
On the topic of Seville, I don't think there's much more I could add that hasn't already been said about the shambles of organisation by UEFA and the Policia. If you weren't there it's hard to really describe how poorly organised it was, but that being said everything up until reaching the stadium was amazing. The locals were great, and I was able to have lots of discussions with them about our great club, plus the Frankfurt fans that I met were all really friendly too.
2022/23
Personally, I'm very excited to see what Gio and his backroom staff can do next season. I think it was clear from how the season ended that they have a vision on how they want us to play, and now that the players have bought in you can see them improving. None more so than Calvin Bassey.
As a fan I'd love to see big Bassey stay, he was absolutely fantastic in the latter half of the season, but as a realist, I know that if we want to get the maximum value for him we likely need to sell this summer. His stock is never likely to be higher than after Man of the Match performances in the Europa League Final and the Scottish Final when all eyes will have been on him. With Nigeria not making the World Cup, it is unlikely his stock will increase, and in order to continue the precedent set by the Nathan Patterson sale we need to look to maximise on this.
The most important part of this though, is that if Bassey is sold, or even another of Aribo, Kent, Morelos etc. the money is re-invested in the playing squad. We can't allow the squad to stand still, or regress, as we did last summer. We had a real opportunity to assert dominance domestically at the end of last season, but instead, we didn't invest (for a number of reasons, lack of player sale/choosing to keep all the current squad etc.) and it's important we don't do that again.
I'm not entirely sure I fully trust Ross Wilson to be the man leading that squad improvement. So far his results have been more miss than hit, no more so high profile than Aaron Ramsey. It pains me to say that as I was more excited about that signing than any signing in our history, for me it was huge that we signed such a big name from my home country, but I think his penalty against Frankfurt perfectly sums up the loan spell.
I'm not blaming Ramsey for the miss, it was a terrible penalty, but putting on a player at the last minute to take a penalty is always a risk. It did however perfectly sum up the loan, and unfortunately, that is how he will be forever remembered in a Rangers shirt I'm sure.
Any player recruitment in the summer must, and I mean must, be players that Gio wants and feels can fit his style of play. There's little point in signing players you think you can get for cheap and flip for big money if the manager doesn't want them, or they don't fit the team's style of play, because then you just end up with players who can't get a game and we end up selling for a loss, ala Cedric Itten.
A huge positive is that the defence looks a lot more positive with Connor Goldson signing an extension and John Souttar coming in. There are still questions around the ability of Souttar and Helander to stay fit, with good reason, however having Goldson there as the ever-present is a huge boost. If we can keep the other two fit for 75% of the season each we should have a solid pairing each week, and with Balogun moving on hopefully that's a sign Leon King is ready to make the step up to a regular first-team squad player.
If we can bring in a right-winger and a striker to directly challenge for a first-team spot, instead of squad players, then we should have a very good team ready to complete on all fronts. I have the faith in Gio and his team to make next season even better than the last two.
Allan McGregor
The final elephant in the room is Allan McGregor. There's been lots of talk lately that he is possibly signing a new deal, led lately by the writer for a subscription-based sports website... though that article proved to be wrong on a few points within hours of being published, so make of that what you will.
Personally, I hope McGregor doesn't sign on for another season. I've said a few times he's now the best Rangers keeper ever in my opinion for how great he's been for such a prolonged period of time, but last season showed that you can, unfortunately, stay too long. I'm not saying he is solely to blame for us losing the league, at all, but McGregor of the seasons before would not have made a number of the mistakes that he made last season and I can only see those mistakes becoming more prevalent if he stays.
If he does stay for one more season I will of course cheer him on as I've done throughout his career, but I hope it's more in a supportive role than as the no.1.
Who will replace him? I don't know, will we buy someone? Will it be Jon McLaughlin? I personally would be more than happy to have McLaughlin as no.1. I know a lot of fans aren't enthused by this idea, but for me he's never let us down when he has played, and when he stepped in this season I always felt a lot more confident. It also provides some stability with the back 5.
Outgoings
It's hard to predict any outgoings, as I've said we probably need to capitalise on Bassey's reputation right now, but if we can't agree to extensions with players like Aribo, Kent and Morelos we may need to look to move them on also while we can command a fee. Letting them run down contracts and leave for free would be another failing for Ross Wilson.
It's probably time to move on from Barisic too in my opinion. Far too many times he seems to shrink in the face of a challenge. He also seems to have a knack for feeling a twinge if a game looks like it's going to penalties.
It was definitely the right move to allow Cedric Itten to move on, unfortunately it didn't work out for him here and I don't think we played to his strengths, but his time at the club was definitely over and a new club, in familiar surroundings, will be good for his career. It's a shame we took a loss though.
Another I'd move on from, and this won't be popular, is Nikola Katic. I've never bought into him, he's provided some great moments, sure, but he's too much of a bomb scare for me and I'd much rather see Leon King get game time and develop than Katic I'm afraid.
Final Thoughts
I don't like to lead any articles with discussions on people we've lost as I don't want to use grief for clicks, hence I won't mention it when promoting the article, but it would be remiss of me not to acknowledge the difficult season it has been for our club on a human level this season with the losses of legends Walter Smith and Jimmy Bell.
Both were synonymous with the club and you could see that with the outpouring of love and grief at their loss.
There are very few kit-men in world football whose passing would instigate so many heartfelt tributes from current and past players alike as well as from the fans. Heck, 99% of fans outside of Rangers wouldn't even know the name of their kit-man.
It's also heartbreaking to hear of Andy Goram's declining health. A man who provided so many of my age and older with wonderful moments supporting the famous. I wish him as much joy and love as possible for as long as he has left.
To end the article I'd like to thank all of you who have read the blog over the last year and a bit, and who have started to tune into the podcasts on The 4th Official network. We've had a bit of a hiatus from Whose Team Is It Anyway while we were in Seville and then family holidays but hopefully we will have a new episode drop soon, and once we finish this season we will begin recording an all EPL series with guests from some of the bigger EPL podcasts and I'm looking forward to seeing how we can extend the show.
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