WHEN his defence of a heavily criticised signing policy included name-dropping Matt Gilks and players he'd had at another club, it's fair to suggest Mark Warburton finds himself in a bit of a spot.
But before we get to yesterday’s press conference, it’s important to say something.
While reading the Rangers manager is no easy task, and it would be quite wrong to claim to know what is going on inside what must be a frazzled mind, he gave off the impression of a man ready to come out swinging.
Perhaps Warburton knows he's approaching the end-game, if he is not already there, and therefore is not going to watch what he says any more. Maybe he's just had enough of it all.
A journalist’s job is to be as objective as possible and it was only right Rangers’ transfers since Frank McParland, this supposed super scout, arrived to some fanfare 15 months ago, were questioned.
However, and hands up if this is way off the mark, a problem for Warburton is he doesn't feel supported by some senior figures within the club and there are certainly a few on the fringes who no longer bother whispering their discontent.
It is difficult not feel a degree of sympathy for a guy whose work ethic and commitment cannot be faulted.
Getting back to what has been a lot of money wasted by a football club that doesn’t have a lot of money, Warburton had a few things to say about the transfer policy.
“There are questions asked because we’re 27 points behind Celtic, I understand that, but there’s many successes that haven’t been mentioned,” said Warburton.
“Is Clint Hill a success? Is Lee Hodson a success? Was Matt Gilks a success? So you go through the team. Jordan Rossiter has been injured and very unfortunate. Niko Kranjcar is very unfortunate. You can go through every team.
“Last year we were fortunate to get every single one right and that is highly unusual. Normally you say to yourself 'get seven out of ten right' and any boss would take that. So maybe we were very lucky last year and a little unlucky this year, that’s the way the game goes.”
And then when asked if he had learned anything in terms of future recruitment, Warburton retreated to a familiar place.
“The question would be are we any different from other teams, in terms of recruitment success rate,” he said.
“So you look around and I could take you at Brentford and say we probably spent £3.25 million and it’s been sold for £45 million. Andre Gray was half a million quid, Moses Odubajo was a million quid sold for X million, Stuart Dallas was five thousand, Jake Bidwell, Adam Forshaw. We can kept saying that, we’ve proven ourselves in terms of buying players, some go wrong you can’t control injuries.”
That’s all very good but he’s not the manager of Brentford any more. He’s at Rangers and the supporters, quite frankly, don’t give a flying toss about his previous recruitment.
He asked: “The fact Joe Garner gets applauded off and they are all singing his name round the stadium, what does that tell you?
“We spoke at the time, and you guys said you haven’t got to score goals to get a resounding ovation at Ibrox, it’s all about the battling attributes, the work ethic, and the guts Joe showed against Hearts.
“He didn’t score but I said at the time if you’d walked in in the 85th minute you’d have thought he’d scored four. Is he a success or not? Is he settling in still?
“With Michael O’Halloran, could he do more? Yes, of course he could do more. Has he been given enough chances? Maybe, maybe not, but the flip side of that is Kenny Miller has surprised many people. Kenny himself would not have thought for one second he’d have started this many games and be this successful but he has been.
“Someone said to me Philippe Senedros could have played more time, he could have done but Clint Hill wouldn’t have played who has been outstanding. So there is always a ying and a yang for every situation.”
Nothing can prepare you for this. Not doing multi-million pound deals in the City, nor working on the NextGen series and certainly not being manager of Brentford. This is Rangers. It’s not the real world.
Asked if he was been unfairly picked on, probably an apt phrase, Warburton said: “You tell me. I have been here 18 months. I think if you are the manager of Rangers, manager of Celtic or any major club you are going to get the abuse. We lost heavily, 4-1, so you are going to get the barrage of comments. But you have to deal with it.
‘Am I surprised by the ferocity? Maybe. But I am told that is life in Glasgow and that I don’t get it. I do get it. Rest assured, I absolutely get it. I am not a rocket scientist but I am not stupid.
“You just get on with your job. We will be here until 6pm tonight. There are some games to watch on WyScout and a game to prepare for this weekend. That’s all you can do. You can’t go and play golf in this weather.”
Then the thorny topic of statistics, or to be more precise, Warburton’s use of them after points have been dropped.
“For any industry to ignore stats is ludicrous. If you ignore your possession stats, your shot stats, your chances created, your final third entries, your penalty box entries – if you ignore all of that then you shouldn’t be in the game of football.
“If people want to use it against me then fine. Managers don’t have the comeback because whatever we say can be shouted down.
“But that fact is that it is a massively important part of the equation. If you are looking at a player, you look at him visually. Frank will go and look at a player, but there are also all the various stats on a player.
“Of course they’re important. People who say they are not are totally ignorant.”
Warburton can always rely on his captain, Lee Wallace, to front up and back him.
“From working with the manager closely, I can we are 100 per cent behind him, he said. “If there is doubt elsewhere, there is no doubt in any one of those players. What the manager has done since he’s come in has been first class in terms of everything he’s put in place.
“The style is now evident and that style, of course, is something we could do better with on the pitch. There’s no doubt about that. The technical development I’ve seen in players, the tactical development I have also seen, everything within what he can do has been spot-on for me. It’s been first class.
“We are in great hands and we, as players, now have to do better on the pitch, stop the mistakes at one end and be better at the top end.”
That's something everyone can agree on.
Tickets for the 2017 Rangers Player of the Year Awards Dinner at the Hilton Glasgow on Sunday, 23 April are on sale now. To book, call the sales team on 0871 702 1972* (option 2), email: events@rangers.co.uk or book online at www.rangers.co.uk.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel