Fans Should Be Careful What They Wish For ...

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Record Sport Columnist Says Support Must Back Chairman Critics Need To Remember Murray Has Always Had Interests Of The Club At Heart

RANGERS have a section of angry and disillusioned fans looking for chairman Sir David Murray to go.

My message to them would be short and simple: Be careful what you wish for.

Do those Rangers fans voicing their opinion want a man who has the club at heart to walk out of Ibrox and be replaced by a Vladimir Romanov figure?

Of course not and it seems to me like knee-jerk reactions.

People are looking at the club and comparing everything to the successful spell during the 1990s.

But times have changed at Ibrox and across the football world.

David Murray is 100 per cent behind Rangers and is trying to keep the club going in the right direction.

Of course, he has not got every decision right. He would admit that himself. For instance, the Steven Davis signing saga dragged on for far too long in the summer.

He was always going to become a Rangers player but it went on beyond the Champions League ties against FBK Kaunas and without him Rangers lost out.

But no one gets everything right and it should be remembered Murray only wants what is best for the club.

Do you really think he wishes to sell Kris Boyd or anybody else of value to the team?

Of course he doesn't but he is only doing what needs to be done. Murray has, to me, always done his best for Rangers and the supporters.

There appears to be a list of fans' gripes. One of them is about morale being lower than at any time in the past 24 years.

Was morale low at the UEFA Cup Final in Manchester in May?

Morale was high during the majority of those 24 years because of what Murray did for Rangers.

He provided the foresight and backing to allow the club to have great success. Even recently, when the majority wanted Paul Le Guen to go, he was axed. The majority wanted Walter Smith and Alistair McCoist to come in. They came in. Those were Murray's decisions.

It is now up to the majority to start paying Murray back and getting behind him at this crucial time instead of looking to have him out.

The management team are also doing all they can.

Look at what they inherited from Le Guen. It was a catastrophe, a half-sunk ship, avessel going absolutely nowhere. They rescued that vessel in a faster time than anybody could have dared imagine.

To me the reconstruction is still only two-thirds complete because there are still people on the playing staff from a previous regime who need to go.

There was a joke doing the rounds before Tuesday's Homecoming Scottish Cup clash against St Johnstone suggesting Rangers players would have price tags rather than numbers on the back of their shirts.

Given the club have already gone public onthe need to reduce the squad during the transfer window there was more than an element of truth about the wisecrack.

In fact, between now and the end of the month, the majority of Walter's first-team squad will be playing either for their own futures or for the chance of moving to a bigger league.

I've always stressed to players they should play each game as if it was going to be their last.

If you have that attitude you will never fall short. You will never let the club down and you will never let yourself down.

Rangers need fringe guys to go but it's a problem the management team cannot really do anything about.

Five of the top players have been bracketed as not for sale and they want to try to sell the others.

But if the others don't - or won't - go one major name will have to be sold and fans just have to put their trust in the manager and chairman to get it right. They have to keep faith. Walter and Alistair cannot fix everything overnight and to be honest the job they have done since replacing Le Guen is incredible.

Taking that group of players to a European final and having them fighting for four trophies as the season drew to a close was an immense achievement.

But once the bar has been raised people keep looking for it to be pushed even higher and sometimes that is just not possible.

Yes, I can understand the frustrations of some of the fans. They want success and don't want to be second best.

But that is exactly why Walter and Alistair and the rest of the boys were brought back.

To try to get them back to the top. For instance, look at the work done to get Pedro Mendes in at Ibrox.

A fantastic player brought from, arguably, the best league in the world. That was down to the chairman and the manager.

To be honest, I'm not really surprised the chairman, manager and captain Barry Ferguson are getting stick at the moment.

That is just football these days. They can be the best thing since sliced bread one minute but when times get tough they suddenly become incompetent and not fit for office.

We've seen it recently with the English cricket team when the coach and skipper were blamed for the failings in India.

As a result, both get the bullet while the chairman of selectors gets it in the neck for appointing them in the first place.

Asimilar scenario is unfolding at Ibrox just now with Murray, Walter and Barry. Yet, this is the time when everybody, supporters included, should be sticking together.

I'm well aware you cannot live in the past but surely the manager deserves some time to prove he can make this situation work to his advantage.

As for Murray, there is a danger of fans losing sight of where his heart lies.

So who does he leave in charge if he goes? There could be people out there who would promise the world but have no real interest in Rangers.

To have an individual like that in charge instead of Murray would be a recipe for disaster.

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