Ibroxholm

You can argue about Tav not being good enough defensively and his performances dipping significantly from where they were but I’m not having the ‘bottler’ argument. Time and time again, he has stood up and taken vital penalties for us and pretty well converted them all under the severest of pressure. He’s no bottler. Unless a good offer comes in for him over the summer, it would be stupid not to keep Tav (same with Goldson). However, they should be viewed as backup, phasing them out over the next season similar to what we did with Steve Davis. We know they don’t have that bit extra to get us over the line, we need new blood in there.

They were extremely fortunate to end up with the Australian as manager after being rejected by their main target and profiting from the equivalent of insider information on the Japanese market, a market largely overlooked in Europe. Their signings since he departed have arguably not been any better than ours.

Looks like it’s going to be pretty windy tomorrow night also. If the game goes ahead, it’s likely to be a bit of a lottery in more ways than one.

So on the back of a reaction to a bad performance yesterday, you going discard him. And bring in who? Who is this magic player aiming in the wings that’s going to solve our problems? And yes, persevering is the right word in the world Rangers function in at the moment. We need to persevere with the players we have who we think have some quality because the days of going out and buying a DeBoer, Van Brockhurst and Gazza are long gone. Any new players we bring in are essentially out of the bargain bin and we saw from our dealings last summer the level of success that brings. Even with a good manager such a Clement, he’ll struggle to get good young players in our price range this summer. The relative success of Clement since he came in has been perseverance with not the greatest squad or the most talented of players. Although more than likely they’ll be a few signings this summer, it’ll still be the same next season.

But I do know what Lawrence was like pre-injury. Is that player gone? You clearly think so, I think he’s worth persevering with because we don’t have a great deal of quality in our team in regard to composure and picking the right final pass. Ok, arguably the three/four you mention have had been the pick of the bunch this season. Only four though, we need 7 or 8 at least.

Starting midfield of Lundstram, Sterling and Diomande (maybe slightly advanced) would be my choice. Can bring on Cantwell or Lawrence later on in the game if we need a bit of invention. Its our defence that gives me the fear.

I hope I’m right and you’re wrong. Although I think it’ll need a good preseason to see the best of him, we do need him to produce the quality I think he has in our remaining games. It could just make the difference and we need our better players to produce because, to be honest, we’re not a great team at the present time.

Clearly his appearances have been limited by long term injury but he looked the pick of the bunch before he got injured. Do any of our current team match up to your requirement to give standout, impactive performances. I don’t think so. All I’m saying is he’s a good player in terms of what we have available at the club at the moment.

I’ll trust my own judgement on that which at the moment seems to align with our manager.

Doesn’t seem to be vastly overrated on here this morning. He had a poor game yesterday along with the rest of the team. On that evidence, none of our current players are good enough to get where we want to get to (wherever that may be) I still think he’s a player who can contribute and improve us. Clearly, there are better players out there if we can afford them. Again, that could be said for anyone in our team.

Any of our players can be sold if we get the right price for them or indeed pick up a bad injury. Still doesn’t take away from the fact that he’s a good player on his day and will contribute next season if he’s still with us.

That was enough to show he had good quality. Also saw him play for Derby and he was the best player they had.

Similarly, I’ve lost count of the players over the years that fans have dismissed when coming back from injury and have gone to be major contributors to us once they get back up to full match sharpness.

He only needs to get back to the form he showed before he got injured to show he can be an important player for us. Would say he lacks match sharpness at the moment which will be emphasised in matches like yesterday. I like Diomande but I thought even he struggled with the pace of play yesterday which he’ll learn from.

Lawrence was off the pace today but is still a good player imo. It takes a long time to come back from a year long injury. Doubt we’ll see the best of him until next season.

With the home game against us, think they are probably favourites. First goal at their midden will be vital in order for us to get a result.

Think he’s a good solid goalkeeper, reminds me quite a bit of Chris Woods. Don’t think he’s as good a shot stopper as either Goram or McGregor though.

After how many seasons Tav has been with us, you’d think we’d learn that we have to take the rough with the smooth in terms of his strengths and weaknesses. That said, he was pretty awful first half. Showed balls to step up and put the penalty away after missing his last two.

First half we were all over the place. Losing a freak goal in 45 seconds didn’t help. Also thought it was more difficult to play towards the Broomloan end. Wind was a problem throughout but long balls played towards the Broomloan end tended to skip right through to the goalkeeper/out of play. Thought this allowed both teams to get penned in a bit when playing in that direction. Still doesn’t excuse our performance first half though, should be better able to adapt to conditions.

Lot of greeting for nothing. Fans who’ve been paying full whack for a number of years get told they are being moved to the seats no one else wanted to buy. Great. Just to accommodate them and a small portion of our own support who’d rather our own fans get bumped so that they have the privilege of paying top dollar to be treated like shit at their dump.

I think that’s a cop out, the big boy made the decision not us. Would that be the same SPFL that sat on its hands when they refused to give us tickets for the last OF game and have mismanaged the game in this country since it was created. I suggest that the team across the city would not have accepted the SPFLs decision unless it was favourable to them financially and politically. At the very least, I hope they were told that they would have to guarantee any shortfall in income as a result of their decision. As for Sky getting involved, presumably on the auspices of improving the product. Since most of the games they cover are OF away games, why are they not getting involved in us playing away games with nearly empty stands, or games being played in plastic or cowfields.

Poor show from the club. Why make the move in the first place to restrict their numbers if you’re just going to capitulate further down the line when put under a bit of pressure. Nothing has changed from our point of view, the reasons for reducing their numbers still apply. All that has happened is that the club looks as weak as f_ck once again and a thousand or more of our fans who have loyally stumped up for season tickets over the last few years (and probably paid extra into the Mygers scam) have been shafted. Even the fans who get reseated will more than likely being given isolated seats, split from the people they sit with. As for Sky getting involved, should tell them to go and get stuffed. They’ve got a 5 year deal remaining at basement prices, if they’re going to get involved in this they should be at least made to pay the amount the club loses out financially on this. That and we should be bumping up the ticket prices big time for that lot when they come. Additionally, if we had any future plans to fill in the corner or extend the Broomloan rear might as well forget it now.

Was the Brazilian guy we were trying to get from Cyprus in the January window not a right back (or maybe he a left back)? Wouldn’t be surprised if we still had an interest him in the summer, looked quite good attacking wise and fairly low cost.

Tend to agree with the OP although think he might have been better to leave it a day or two before posting. Clement has generally managed to get the team to over perform since he arrived, not sure if player for player we are any better than we were the last couple of seasons, certainly not now with injuries taking the toll. Realistically, with the players we have at our disposal, if we manage to win the league this season it’ll be a great season, if we win the treble it will be exceptional. Europe was always going to be a step too far this season, especially with the standard of the teams left in it. And quite honestly, if there is one season we want to miss out getting to the final, it’s this year. I know there was a lot of bravado of going to Dublin and it would have been a great wind up against the celtic fans but it would have been a poisoned chalice with regard to the potential trouble and publicity it would have generated.

Used to get frustrated a bit at Alfie because when he got a goal opportunity he just about always put his foot through the ball with little thought to doing anything different like chipping or rounding the goalkeeper. After 8 months of Dessers, I just wish for once he would do the same rather than being so deliberate.