Everything seemed to be heading in the right direction after the January transfer window closed, yes, we would all have probably liked one or two new faces but, the ones that we did bring in seemed to hit the ground running – and then we played in the league cup final.
Since then, there has been a toxic environment on social media, banners have been shown at Ibrox in protest at both Stewart Robertson and Ross Wilson and there is an accusation that the board isn’t doing enough to close a gap to Celtic that is all of our own making.
Speaking exclusively to This is Ibrox’s Tommy McIntyre, Rangers third largest shareholder Stuart Gibson, has thrown his weight behind the under-pressure pair:
“There is a scarcity of engagement between the club and the fans, I’ve noticed recently that John Bennett is trying to correct that but I think there’s been, whether it’s deserved or not, a lot of criticism, a lot of noise about the fact that sometimes Stewart doesn’t defend us vociferously when allegations or accusations come out about the club.
“When I look at Stewart and I look at the other senior management, Ross, James Bisgrove, these three guys get a lot of undeserved flack to be quite honest. Ross Wilson’s doing a brilliant job. He doesn’t have ample resources to work with but he’s knocked it out the park with Calvin Bassey and Joe Aribo. They’re massive home runs for the club.”
Gibson is definitely right about the fan engagement, however, there will be plenty of fans who disagree with his opinion on Wilson and Robertson.
Wilson’s track record will always be judged by the number of trophies that are won by the squad that he has helped to assemble and the fact that the core of the starting XI against Celtic last week still featured a number of players who were recruited before he arrived in late 2019 does not look good.
He can point to being unlucky with injuries in some instances, or the fact that Michael Beale chose not to pick his two January acquisitions but the fans will never judge a sporting director on how much money they may or may not make the club – yes, it’s part of the job but it’s not how success at Rangers will ever be judged.
We know Wilson doesn`t have ample resources . its all the more reason he doesn`t waste what we do have both in fees and wages and there is no argument that he has done that .How many of our signing in the last FOUR transfer windows are first picks , 3 or 4 out of maybe 15 signings .Its not good enough . I do agree that James Bisgrove is doing a good job and it helps that at last someone has explained the Sydney Cup deal. Why didn`t the board explain this and save themselves a lot of grief .By the way your headline is wrong , this guy is not a director .If he talks this much sense may be he should be.
Don’t think so when you look at the amount of time signings are unavailable through injury. And some of the players signed have been poor on the whole with odd one a success, too many good players targeted but let slip through our fingers for sake of couple of hundred thousand who have went on to become top notch players.
Signings policy has cost us dearly money wise and on the pitch results as was highlighted by champions league campaign.