tommyw

The highest scoring RB of the 21st century, captaining his team from the Scottish Championship to a major European final. Roy of the Rovers stuff.

Don't know if yous can view this in the UK (its CBS Sports/Paramount+ here) but when Lundstrams goal goes in the noise of the crowd is so loud the mics can't even register it properly 😅 at first i was wondering why its so quiet but realised they probably haven't developed the technology to capture the sound of the Ibrox roar yet. 
What an atmosphere that must have been. Gutted I can't be at home or in Seville for the final.

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I've not turned on the telly, radio, read a paper or anything all day. Apart from work, every single second ive been awake has been spent watching videos and highlights of last night, playing heart and hand's reactions to last night or listening to  Belinda Carlisle. 
 

You’d think a 30 million pound kid coming from Man Utd up to Scotland and barely getting a kick might take the huff a bit but he seems to be absolutely loving it up here 😂

Long post but fuck it. Not sure if the right thread but it could go anywhere really 
Still watching videos. Still reliving last night. I didn’t manage a ticket but The Louden was equally as good - I’ll never forget it. A lot of reflection over the last 10-15 years on the train back down the road and all through today - away trips to Forfar, Berwick and others. Skelpings at the hands of the taigs which at the time were fucking crushing. The January drop offs every year. The frustration. The European nights at both home and abroad. The 2019 Cup Final defeat. 55. A rollercoaster of a season and disappointment at the swing in the league. Seeing off Borussia Dortmund, Red Star Belgrade, Braga and now Leipzig. The euphoria of the SC Semi-Final. Who knows what’s to come?
I have been critical of this squad of players for a fair chunk of the last 4 years. We all have. After the result at Porkheid in February I openly posted on here that I was done with the squad and for all I cared they could all leave then, never mind in the summer. 
I’ve been majorly eating those words the last couple of weeks. I love these guys more than I have cared to admit. It has been such a journey over the past 4 years and we’ve kicked every ball and headed every cross with them. I guess that’s why the lows are so hard to take. It’s been pretty much the same core of players all the way through which I then guess is why moments like last night are so emotional. This squad has cemented itself in the books for 55. They are now on the cusp of eternal glory and legendary status and if achieved their lives will change forever.
What really hit it home for me tonight about what we are on to was on SSB there was discussion about Tavernier and his status as a Rangers player in years to come. There was a thread on here about whether or not he is already a legend and I said yes he is because his numbers and performances over the years have been phenomenal - all he needs is some more trophies in the cabinet. However, surprisingly it was Hugh Keevins who brought up the point. Tavernier is 90 minutes away from potentially being a European trophy lifting Rangers Captain. The last captain to do so was John Greig in 1972, as we all know, and John Greig has a statue outside Ibrox. Keevins may have been hinting at that’s where it is heading but he denied as such, though he did say that it then means Tavernier can be mentioned in the same breath as John Greig - two European trophy lifting captains.
According to Transfrmarkt, Tavernier has, for Rangers:
Apps: 343
Goals: 81
Assists: 106
If he does indeed to go onto lift the trophy on May 18, he is instantly Hall of Fame material for me. I hope more than anything I’ve ever hoped that he does. I hope every single one of those players have their hands on that trophy in two weeks time. From McGregor to Kamara to Jack, Davis and Sakala. To Wright, Arfield and Roofe. To the injured trio Helander, Morelos and Hagi. To Big John Lundstram who is writing his own script. They all fucking deserve this. We all fucking deserve this. From the heights of 3 in a row to the lows of the Third Division and the rise back to the top. Never in a million fucking years did I ever think we would be in this position.
I love you Rangers FC. From that first whistle in Seville until the very, very last we will be with you every single breathing second. No fucking surrender Rangers!

We won the 3rd division trophy 9 years ago. Crazy to think that we could be lifting the Europa cup aloft soon. Seemed a world away back then.  We are well and truly back where we belong! 
All thanks to the loyalty of our support and the dedication  and hard work of staff such as Jimmy Bell. 
I don't think the Ibrox roar has ever been as loud as it was last night. We have come back from the dark days all the stronger for it. 
If ever a fanbase deserved to win a European trophy it is ours. To do it on our 150th anniversary and 50 years on from the last trophy would make it all the sweeter.

Tremendous effort 

I'm still struggling with last night  Honestly felt like an out of body experience watching The Best On Earth tuck away that 3rd goal.  
I could see it was a blue jersey, I could see it was at Ibrox....I could tell it was Rangers fans celebrating, but it just didn't feel real somehow.....hard to explain. I've been in a complete daze all day long

Been going to 30-50 football matches a year for the last 35 years. That's the best of the lot last night. Best atmosphere, best occasion, most emotional and memorable event.
An absolute privilege to have been at.

Sorry but I’m still just full of emotion 
Still think back to those dark days of 2012,13,14,15 and sitting on my seat questioning what is happening and has happened to my club . The days of famous title wins and European nights seemed something of both the distant past and distant future at those points 
Then these last two seasons have happened . We are truly back to the club I recognised and grew up with 

A big thank you to everyone on the long road back who have made this possible ... McCoist certainly did his bit and of course Gerrard too 

Brilliant article. Spot on by Tom English.
By Tom EnglishBBC Scotland
Last updated on2 hours ago2 hours ago.From the sectionRangers
John Lundstram (right) scored Rangers' winning goal against RB Leipzig
All credit to Nostradamus and his top-drawer prophecies, but as impressive as he was when predicting the Great Fire of London and the coming of the French Revolution, not even the big man could have foretold this gobsmacking Rangers story.
After the momentous events of Thursday at Ibrox, we are now deep in the realms of the sublimely surreal.
Having started their European campaign with one win from six games, Rangers are going to Seville for a Europa League final against the 11th best team in Germany - on current standings - having already eliminated the second and fifth best.
In the beginning, there were 32 teams in the group phase. Now, only two are left. Napoli, Lazio and Atalanta are gone. Borussia Dortmund, Bayer Leverkusen and RB Leipzig are gone. Barcelona, Sevilla, Real Betis and Real Sociedad are gone. Lyon, Marseille and Monaco are gone. Porto are gone.
Rangers beat Leipzig to reach final
Road to first European final in 14 years
Rangers 'couldn't write better script'
Three of the top seven clubs in Italy were eliminated, so were three of the top five in Germany, four of the top six in Spain, three of the top seven in France, and the top club in Portugal. As stellar as they all are, there's no sign of them.
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It's just Rangers and Eintracht Frankfurt. The team that hasn't won a European trophy in 50 years plays the team that hasn't won one in 42 years. It's all so refreshing and so utterly remarkable.
The bookmakers make the Germans the favourites. Given what Rangers have done to Dortmund - 24 points ahead of Eintracht in the Bundesliga - and Leipzig - 14 points ahead - where they're coming from is anybody's guess. We checked with 17 significant players in the odds-laying world and all 17 had Eintracht at the head of the market.
As excellent as Eintracht have been in the Europa League, Rangers, with their indomitable will, must be considered favourites in the real world. Let's write that again for emphasis, because it's such a striking thing to say.
Forget about the bookies and just study the football - Rangers must be considered favourites in the Europa League final. Nostradamus' whiskers would have been twitching at the fantastic improbability of all of this.
Rangers captain James Tavernier (left) scored his seventh goal in the Europa League this season
In seeing off Leipzig, they once again showed astonishing levels of composure and heart in what was their 60th game of the season. They had no recognised striker fit enough to play and yet scored twice in the opening half hour - and should have had a third - against a side with the second best defensive record in the Bundesliga.
They were going through at that point. Then they were going to extra time when Christopher Nkunku scored midway through the second half. Then it looked as if they might be going out as they started to wobble under Leipzig pressure.
'Every one of those players stepped up'
What happened next will be spoken about for as long as football is played at Ibrox. Locked together at 2-2 on aggregate with 10 minutes to go, there was the real prospect of another 120-minute night for Rangers - it would have been their third in 22 days as part of a run during which they have played nine times in little over a month.
Every Rangers fan on the planet would have been hypnotised by what was going on in front of them, every last one of them a tortuous amalgam of emotions, incapable of taking their eyes off the action while suffering through every second.
Incredibly, the picture changed again when John Lundstram scored to make it 3-1. You almost had to rub your eyes to make sure it had actually happened. Rangers had looked tired and increasingly vulnerable, but they found something extra, something that hit Leipzig square between the eyes and knocked them out.
Lundstram has become a towering presence in this team and his goal will only add another layer to his legend. The truth is, though, that on the biggest night at Ibrox in 50 years and in the biggest game of these Rangers' players lives, they produced a performance of power and substance, a display of the ages. Every one of them stepped up.
For the fifth time in Europe this season, James Tavernier got Rangers' opening goal. Leipzig would have known all about his freakish menace from full-back, but knowing what he can do is not the same as being able to stop him doing it.
Once it would have been heresy to compare any Rangers right-back to the great Sandy Jardine, but we're inching into acceptable territory with Tavernier now. Just as Jardine scored the opening goal against Bayern Munich the last time Ibrox hosted a European semi-final, second leg, so did Tavernier half a century on.
What a force of nature he is. It was his seventh goal of the tournament - he's the competition's leading scorer - his 16th of the season and his 35th in his last 100 games.
'Relentless Rangers show character again'
The notion that Leipzig would get spooked by the Ibrox noise seemed a touch fanciful in the preamble. It was easy to see how Rangers would get inspired by the commotion in their own stadium, but Leipzig cowed by it?
This is a team that has gone to pretty formidable places in Germany and beyond, a club full of respected players linked with moves to Manchester United and Barcelona, PSG and Juventus, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur. Even if the fees reported are only half right, the numbers are outrageous.
And yet they are a side that has lost two German Cup finals (4-1 and 3-0) and one Champions League semi-final (3-0). They might have class, but they also have a glass jaw. We suspected that before and we know it to be true now.
Rangers have lost kit man Jimmy Bell (left) and former manager Walter Smith (right) this season
When Glen Kamara coolly slotted Rangers' second goal, the idea of Leipzig losing their nerve didn't seem so outlandish. They should have been three down after half an hour, Joe Aribo missing his connection from three yards out. Leipzig's body language told of a team that was shellshocked, like a fighter shipping blows in clusters and not knowing what to do next.
This was Rangers doing what they did in Germany - controlled fury, harrying their opponents at every turn - but there was an added flourish in attack. Every time they moved forward, they looked dangerous.
You watched them playing like this and scratched your head at the memory of them dropping so many points domestically. Giovanni van Bronckhorst sat in the stand at Hampden watching the players he was about to inherit concede three goals in 38 minutes against Hibernian in the League Cup semi-final in November. Now look where he is.
In what has been an emotional week in a profoundly sad season off the field - the death of their much-loved kitman Jimmy Bell following on from the loss of one of their greatest managers, Walter Smith, in October - Rangers people might find comfort in the belief that they had help from on high in the closing minutes.
Something propelled them forward, that's for sure. When they can't have had much left in their legs - the crowd, the celestial, who knows - picked them up and drove them on. They were relentless. They've shown this side of their character so many times of late.
The biggest game of their season, and their century, is less than two weeks away. Football has a spectacular capacity to upset a narrative, so we say this with all respect to the footballing Gods and their infinite powers to ruin a great story, but there's a hint of the unstoppable about Rangers now.

Fucking despise most football outside of us.

...... that'll be in 12 days mate ... what you are feeling now is only the trailer to the blockbuster.
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How do you last 12 days feeling like this, I am buzzing out my tits 
1 hour sleep before work, feel like I’ve just been the victim of a Calvin Bassey challenge 
I fucking love this club 

I thought during some of these ties, if it wasn't for Winston Churchill we'd already be in the Bundesliga.

..... and one player was just over half of that total ..... and was worth every penny ..... Ryan Kent has well paid his transfer fee.
But from the lowest leagues to the EL final this present Rangers team above are worth their weight in gold ... and will prove it on the 18th of May when they are triumphant and lift the trophy ... I genuinely believe this will happen.
Every fucking club in Scotland and every fucking pundit  ... from top to bottom ... should be paying homage to them as we have saved their arses yet again and put Scottish football back on the map by increasing the coefficient way beyond anything previously done by any other club.
Our story could not have been written by the best screen writers .... and would be classed as fiction if it was .... but this season .... our 150th .... will be proof of the pudding that it is a true rags to riches story that deserves all the accolades that come their way ... this team of underdogs have shown they are a force to be reckoned with .... it makes you proud to witness their achievements and even more proud to be part of this rollercoaster that is The Rangers Football Club.
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Watching some of the clips after the final whistle, I'm pretty sure Archie Knox was at the game with Walters grandchildren - if so, great to see Archie looking out for them