Do you actually enjoy watching our games?

[WMT 546]

Not at the moment, no. Hard to believe we've won 6 of the last 7 games with these recent performances.

Strangely enough, the last performance when we kept the ball on the ground (mostly), passed it around nicely, bossed the midfield and looked like a championship winning side, was Hearts at Tynecastle and we all know which one of the 7 games that was...

[Ozblue 4,332]

I'm beginning to question my sanity, getting up at 0530 on Thursday mornings, staying up until 3am Sunday mornings to watch brutal, boring matches. The amount of "ffs" I uttered this morning was a record!

With the players we have, is it too much to ask for a string of passes put together and a bit of pressure on the opposition goal?

Come to a decent state where we get daylight saving and don't have to get up until 0630 to watch a mid-week game,robo.

But then again, we have to stay up until 4.00am on week-end matches

I was going ballistic this morning over that game....I was swearing so loud I woke my next door neighbour up.

[DarcheVinny 1,003]

I love going to Ibrox. I love watching Rangers. So yes, I enjoy watching our games

[Ozblue 4,332]

Come on, Oz. Stop teasing us and spill the beans!

It wasn't meant to be teasing,casey, because at the end of my post, I suddenly remembered what my ex-player commented on after that particular training session in Sydney and it struck a chord with what a fair bit of this thread is about.

Now my mate was one of a few ex-players of mine who attended both our games against Blackburn Rovers on the Sunday and Sydney FC on the Wednesday.

Now the Friday training session lasted for about 90 minutes or so (I'll have to verify that with BeautifulSeas) and consisted mainly of fitness work...a few shots at the keepers...a bit of a lark at sprints and a kick around...a short autograph session and back on the bus.

After we left the ground, Graham asked me if that was the normal Rangers training session, because he didn't see any set piece work...No time spent on improving passing techniques or trying to work out attacking moves etc!

I said I wasn't sure because it was only pre-season training after all, but he came back with a beauty. He said that with what he saw in the first two games, Smith should have had them there for another 90 minutes working on their skills, because they sure needed it.

He also wondered why I used to have him and the lads working for 1-2 hours per training session on skills & set pieces alone + all the other fitness work.

I didn't really have an answer for that.

Surely they do skills & set piece work at ordinary training sessions?

[achaleven 38]

Serious question. Do you enjoy watching us play most games? I know that I don't.

From not being able to complete simple passes, hit a decent set-piece, kill teams off and showing a bit of quality it has me in a rage and in a right state come full time. Regardless of the result watching us play is like being tortured for 90 minutes because you care that much that everything boils over and you just wish that we could manage to play some decent football and do the basics of football for 90 minutes.

3 points is obviously the most important thing but our performances are going to have to improve drastically over the next few weeks and months because recently our performances have not been good enough.

Come Sunday watching the game I expect to be tortured again but come tea time if we beat those bastards then I will be delighted but in order to do so vast improvements are needed. Let's get the finger out Rangers.

Agreed, its murder. Something's wrong, we've got some very very good footballers but as a team they look very very disjointed at the moment. I would say that this must be down to the coaching staff. When you play one up, that player must be able to take the ball in and hold the play up, we don't have anybody that can do that. On the plus side I thought Wiess and Djiouf were different class last night. Also thought they were luck to finish with 11.

[Jimfanciesthedude 25,047]

Surely they do skills & set piece work at ordinary training sessions?

there was a massive rumour doing the rounds when smith was here the first time

it was that brian laudrup and another couple of foreign lads were basically unhappy about the lack of ball work done during training sessions, all smith had the team do was work on their fitness and hope that other teams tire and we then can easily win/see out games

it was rumoured that laudrup and co then encouraged other players to stay back/arrive early so they could do work with the ball at their feet

the idea didnt catch on apparently because (as you know) quite a few of the lads were of the old brigade and most probably felt it wasnt required because they had never done it before, and this apparently passed on to the younger scottish boys as well

[clelandhattrick 8]

After our excellent game at Tynecastle with no rewards? I'll take a shitey three points.

[ronniemca 479]

the truth as i see it is walters a great man manager and good on the tactical side of the game, but i dont think hes big on the coaching side of players . this is what worries me when ally takes over, i dont see any footballing structure in our side, its all about attitude, team strength etc.admittedly you need this, but its anything but nice to watch

[Ozblue 4,332]

there was a massive rumour doing the rounds when smith was here the first time

it was that brian laudrup and another couple of foreign lads were basically unhappy about the lack of ball work done during training sessions, all smith had the team do was work on their fitness and hope that other teams tire and we then can easily win/see out games

it was rumoured that laudrup and co then encouraged other players to stay back/arrive early so they could do work with the ball at their feet

the idea didnt catch on apparently because (as you know) quite a few of the lads were of the old brigade and most probably felt it wasnt required because they had never done it before, and this apparently passed on to the younger scottish boys as well

Well,jbj, if that story is true (and it wouldn't surprise me) then that would tie in with what was seen in Sydney.

It made a bit of a fool of me to be honest, because I'd been telling all these Ozzie guys about how professional Rangers were in the the detail given to playing and training and then my mate saw a training session that he reckoned to be a very amateurish session even although it was a pre-season workout.

If that was a typical Rangers training session we witnessed, I'd have to say that Australian clubs are far ahead when it comes to practising the players skills and set-piece routines.

[docspiderman 1,262]

I love watching Rangers....always have always will.....you sound like (I could be wrong) a typical tv fan

never happy always moaning......if you are a Ger get off your bum and pay the cash....we need it bad...

Glad you enjoy watching our games; I don't but still go to all of them. I do not think anyone who really goes to games and really watches them could disagree with anything amac9 said in his post.

[caseyjones 3,009]

It wasn't meant to be teasing,casey, because at the end of my post, I suddenly remembered what my ex-player commented on after that particular training session in Sydney and it struck a chord with what a fair bit of this thread is about.

Now my mate was one of a few ex-players of mine who attended both our games against Blackburn Rovers on the Sunday and Sydney FC on the Wednesday.

Now the Friday training session lasted for about 90 minutes or so (I'll have to verify that with BeautifulSeas) and consisted mainly of fitness work...a few shots at the keepers...a bit of a lark at sprints and a kick around...a short autograph session and back on the bus.

After we left the ground, Graham asked me if that was the normal Rangers training session, because he didn't see any set piece work...No time spent on improving passing techniques or trying to work out attacking moves etc!

I said I wasn't sure because it was only pre-season training after all, but he came back with a beauty. He said that with what he saw in the first two games, Smith should have had them there for another 90 minutes working on their skills, because they sure needed it.

He also wondered why I used to have him and the lads working for 1-2 hours per training session on skills & set pieces alone + all the other fitness work.

I didn't really have an answer for that.

Surely they do skills & set piece work at ordinary training sessions?

Interesting story, mate. I couldn't tell you whether that is typical or not, but when you look at the lack of basic skills which runs through our side, it would come as no surprise. Jim's story about Laudrup is one that I also heard back then, but it was only ever a rumour, albeit a believable one!

[broxibear87 129]

This is it, we can play so much better than we currently do. Next season, I want to see a fluid 4-3-3, pressing high and us completely out passing the opposition.

We can't do that with SDoW at the back though.

[broxibear87 129]

If Weir decides to play on next season, there will be trouble....

Even if he doesn't play on were in trouble, Bougherra is likely to leave and the Arsenal kid probably going back that just leaves us with Broadfoot or Big Lee at CB

[Ozblue 4,332]

Interesting story, mate. I couldn't tell you whether that is typical or not, but when you look at the lack of basic skills which runs through our side, it would come as no surprise. Jim's story about Laudrup is one that I also heard back then, but it was only ever a rumour, albeit a believable one!

Well! I hope to find out for my self next season when I'm planning to be over for a few months on holiday and get access to our training sessions to see how Ally operates.

I've been fortunate to attend sessions through the years where I studied how Dave Sexton at Chelsea, Tommy Docherty, Morten Olsen and also Hans Westerhof at Ajax trained their squads and it's amazing just how much you learn about coaching and man management from guys like that lot.

I really think the foreign coaches have the right training philosophy where they encourage players to work on the basic skills a lot more than what British coaches do.

I wonder if Coisty would back up Jim's story if somebody asked him!

[Amac9 2,060]

I love watching Rangers....always have always will.....you sound like (I could be wrong) a typical tv fan

never happy always moaning......if you are a Ger get off your bum and pay the cash....we need it bad...

Getting up at 4am on a Saturday morning, travelling to Belfast, 3 hour boat trip to Stranraer, 2 hour drive to Ibrox to watch 90 minutes of football and then the same journey back not getting home until midnight... Typical TV fan

[J-Maestro 11,975]

I only go out of my way to watch Rangers, any other game of football I'll only watch if there's nothing else to do.

[Brian Fantana 28,894]

yes, we've been piss of late.

With the new signings i'd like to see the midfield re-shaped and something has to be done about the defence, how do we go from one of the best in Europe last season to the shite we're seeing this season?

regarding Smith - i think he's still the usual "as long as we win, doesn't matter how many we score" bullshit. We need to be killing games off early and racking up the goals, it'd boost morale no end. instead we get 4-5-1 last nite.

and my overall worry - the fans will stop attending. They won't pay £26 -£30 to watch shite football.

[Guest KarlG45]

I'm usually at my happiest (or most relieved) when the final whistle goes and we've scraped another narrow victory. We just don't seem to be able to give teams a doing like the other mob across the city, and I'm really worried that that could cause us problems later on in the season.

However what can be done? I only watch the games on TV (living in Switzerland, so it's a bit far to travel!!), but it seems to me that we are sometimes waaay too cautious and seem to settle for a narrow lead far too early in the game.

I haven't been Walter Smith's greatest fan in the past (I can still too painfully remember the humpings at home in Europe in the 90's), but I absolutely cannot fault the man for winning us the league in the past two seasons under the most horrendous circumstances.

So, I don't like the brand of football he's been serving up but as I said I can't fault him for sticking to the thing that's brought us success...

[Broxi 11,729]

Living in Canada now there's days i wake up and watch games at 7 in the morning. We may be playing fairly poor just now but I always love watching Rangers, I look forward to it all week.

I will always watch the mighty rangers regardless

I think because it is the team I support it makes it more enjoyable and that if it was some foreign team then I wouldn't enjoy it

[1st_Jan_1994 4,868]

If Jim's story about Laudrup is correct and it's still the same today, in his second spell - it explains a lot.

[RON7736 3]

I actually buzz off going to our games now more than ever. I don't know why, as we even played better football under McLeish and Le Guen than we do now.

Still something magical about watching Rangers play, even tonight when it was dire.

after that comment probably better if you did buzz off

[1st_Jan_1994 4,868]

after that comment probably better if you did buzz off

I should buzz off because I enjoy watching Rangers play, even when they are playing shite?

You sound like a mixed up little man. Only on RangersMedia would you get slated for saying you enjoy watching your team play. Wot a weirdo.

[aliceinchains 0]

Getting up at 4am on a Saturday morning, travelling to Belfast, 3 hour boat trip to Stranraer, 2 hour drive to Ibrox to watch 90 minutes of football and then the same journey back not getting home until midnight... Typical TV fan

All of that and you don't enjoy it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fucking hell...........

[thebooler 4,509]

It disnae help that am sober at most games!

[Scott-RFC 308]

I do

And I rather those who dont, and moan about it for 90 minutes , didnt bother going in the first place