Giovanni van Bronckhorst insists Rangers were never interested in a weekend off to prepare for PSV Eindhoven. The Dutch side were given a domestic break by Eredivisie bosses in between the two legs up the upcoming Champions League playoff showdown, with the of two monumental clashes looming on Tuesday night.
PSV were then due to face Volendam a week on Saturday but that fixture has been pushed back to the end of August. Ibrox legend Ally McCoist launched a scathing attack on Scottish football chiefs for not offering Rangers the same privilege with their trip to Hibs, branding the situation "a shambles".
But Van Bronckhorst reckons there was no need for his team to have extra time off and says the possibility hadn't even crossed his mind despite the news from abroad. He told BBC Sportsound: "Of course, I read the reports in Holland. I never thought about that because of course we are in a demanding schedule but I think we have enough time to prepare for all the games we play in.
"Especially when you play on Tuesday or Wednesday, it gives you more days in between. So no I didn't have any doubt in my mind that we should ask for the game to be cancelled or switched."
Van Bronckhorst's verdict follows McCoist recalling Rangers ' gruelling schedule in the build-up to their UEFA Cup Final defeat to Zenit St Petersburg in 2008. He claimed Scottish football is "blinkered", telling talkSPORT: “It’s a shambles. Particularly the Scottish FA. I keep harping back to when Rangers reached the Europa League Final in 2008, it was an absolute embarrassment.
“They made us play five league games in 11 days and there was a UEFA final in between it. The head of the SFA George Peat came out and said another club director said to him ‘don’t help Rangers’.
“I’ve got the quote in front of me. Ex-SFA supremo Peat told the BBC ‘When Rangers got to the final in Manchester, I got a phone call from a prominent chairman of a club requesting me not to help Rangers in any way’.
“That’s what your dealing with. We’re so blinkered and narrow-minded. Any Scottish team that has an opportunity to do well in Europe should be helped but there’s none. When we played Zenit in 2008 I honestly think they were given three weeks off by their federation and we had to play five league games in 11 days.
“The Dutch FA want to help their teams.”
