Rangers are nothing more than lower Championship slop | OneFootball

Last night’s humiliation at the hands of Brann confirmed Rangers’ utter fall into nothing more than a very, very average Championship-level team. The simple fact is that Rangers have been shopping from dire football markets for years and are now hiring managers at that level as well. Rangers are Championship slop.

From Europe’s pride to domestic mediocrity

What happens when a Championship-level team, a Stoke, or a Bolton, or even League One, faces Europa League sides? Eventually, that punching above the weight from previous years of shining like a beacon in Europe fades, and what Rangers are now left with is a bunch of absolute Championship and League One fodder competing at a level it is simply not capable of.

We hold nothing against Danny Rohl. The fact is he’s a Championship manager, or indeed head coach, and he’s been given a League One-Championship-level squad. This is not a Rangers-level squad. It is nowhere near it. There are only a handful of players even capable of playing in the SPL, never mind Europe. It is a dire, dire squad and a manager who’s not up to the level of a Walter Smith or Alex McLeish.

Boardroom failure driving the collapse

The owners are a big part of this. They endorse the likes of Thelwell and Stewart, who have cultivated this diabolical Rangers squad and regime. And the simple fact is, if you’re going to have a squad that’s at that level, it doesn’t matter how much support you give them, they’re just not going to be good enough.

Rangers yesterday started with a lower-level Premier League goalkeeper in Butland, which is decent, but immediately when we look at the back four, it crumbles hard. Starting with James Tavernier, a Wigan reject, let’s not forget, and a left-back, Meghoma, a Championship reject Preston didn’t even want. How do we expect that level of player to compete at the highest levels of Europe? Indeed, they’re struggling to do so in the league these days.

The simple fact is, Rangers are a shambles from top to bottom. A borderline disgraceful one. And with fans trying to defend this, using the “give him time” line or blaming everybody else, it’s unlikely we’ll see a Walter Smith or even Alex McLeish-level Rangers any time soon. Rangers are literally in a relegation battle this season. Unthinkable. But if you assign players at a lower level, the overall squad will massively dip in quality.

Bargain-bin recruitment and managerial decline

The players we’ve let go were decent — not great, but decent. Dessers has picked up in Greece exactly where he left off at Rangers. And every time Rangers get rid of a player with decent quality, we bring in bargain-bin basement fodder to replace them. It’s nowhere near good enough.

Furthermore, the managerial decline is diabolical as well. The conveyor belt and revolving door of multiple different managers, none of whom are sufficient, really tells its own story. Yes, the fans may have used Boney M for a good feeling and sung Danny Rohl’s name before this one started — and apparently afterwards too — but that doesn’t make him a Rangers-level coach. That good vibe doesn’t change the truth.

We don’t dislike him the way we did Russell Martin. He really was toxic. But Rohl’s not up to it. We know that once again, the usual happy clappers will be screaming “give him time,” “it’s only one game,” the same excuses they’ve used for every single manager that fails. And they’re free to do so. They’re like a broken record we hear all the time.

It isn’t all on Rohl — we admit that. He’s not to blame for everything. But he did pick the players. Then again, the selection of players at his disposal is abysmal. We’re asking a Championship-level manager to take lower-Championship and League One-level players and beat European sides with them. It’s not really going to happen.

Rangers are Championship slop, and we see utterly no way out.