With the announcement that Rangers trip to Pittodrie to face Aberdeen has been understandably cancelled due to the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, the second round of Champions League fixtures is the next set of games to be considered – an entirely different matter given that they come under UEFA’s remit.
Rangers have announced that they are aware of the situation and that the scheduled toe with Napoli might be out of their hands, as released on the club’s website:
“AT this difficult time for the United Kingdom, we are cognisant of ongoing uncertainty regarding supporter arrangements and travel plans for next week.
“We are aware of policing and resource pressures, especially on Tuesday, 13th September.
“We can confirm that discussions are taking place between UEFA, Police Scotland and Rangers regarding our scheduled UEFA Champions League fixture v Napoli on Tuesday, 13th September.
“As present, the game is scheduled to take place at the scheduled date and time.”
The SPFL eventually made the decision to call off all of the fixtures arranged for this weekend as well as lower league and women’s football, not only has this been done as a mark of respect but I’d imagine that policing numbers simply don’t allow for the Premiership games, in particular, to go ahead – Aberdeenshire will be especially short of numbers for extra events.
Had the World Cup not been in November, it probably would have been pretty straight forward to rearrange for a later date, however, the fixture calendar is as tight as it has been at any time since the Covid-19 pandemic and there isn’t much room for manoeuvre.
Hopefully, there will be an update as soon as possible so that fans can either make or cancel any travel arrangements, further details will be released when they are made available.
I think it is time to change the manager at rangers and replace him with Kevin Thompson who did so well at Kelly