Giovanni van Bronckhorst has spoken on some reflections of his time at Ibrox perfectly illustrating how good a man he is but also how he lacks the ruthless instinct that has defined previous Rangers managers.
The recently departed Dutchman was speaking to an outlet in his homeland and in the process provided a very notable quote which will come as no surprise to most as much as it grabs your attention.
“But remarkably, I think actually reaching the Europa League Final with Rangers meant more to me than the actual Final itself and that was because our kitman had just died.”
“Of course, I was disappointed that we lost because of a missed penalty, but I got over that quickly.”
Well, then. How do we process this. Firstly, it was clear how much of a bond that Gio and indeed the squad had with the late, great Jimmy Bell. That is abundantly clear, then and now. We can all recall in our own ways the shock and depth of feeling when the news of untimely passing was made public.
For Rangers collectively to respond the way they did, on and off the pitch, just a couple of days later for the pivotal second leg against RB Leipzig was heroic. The achievement of getting to the final was dedicated to him in the celebrations afterwards, just like Glen Kamara did after his goal.
That moment and the whole feeling of the situation has obviously had a profound impact on van Bronckhorst for him to elevate it to the greatest of his career.
As for the almost dismissive response on the Europa League Final, that is where the massive contrast to the emotions of every Rangers supporter is found. There is no need to go into what happened on that one, but safe to say that the depth of feeling on coming so close yet missing out on Euro glory will live with us all for a very long time to come.