Let Michael Beale copy Ange Postecoglou and he can help Rangers to topple Celtic.
I don’t think Rangers need to rush into appointing a new sporting director. Ross Wilson quit for Nottingham Forest last week and left a massive void at Ibrox. All the talk has been about who will replace him. Michael has come out and said he can oversee both jobs in the short-term. He would want that because, in terms of a manager, it will give him more control and say in who comes in.
When you look across the city, Ange didn’t have a sporting director and did most of his own recruitment. Ange’s influence has been a big deciding factor in the players he has brought in. You can see that. How many of these players would people at Celtic have known about had it not been for Ange. He knew the players, their characters and what they could do. As a result, most of Celtic’s signings have turned out to be a good fit. I don’t think there is any doubt Michael can do the same.
Beale knows who he wants. When you see the two players he has signed, Todd Cantwell and Nicolas Raskin, you can see why they have been brought in. Having more of a control would probably be a good thing for the manager. It is his job to wrestle the power away from Celtic.
Rangers don’t want to rush into a big decision on the sporting director’s front. If they are going to fill the role then it has to be the right person and correct fit for the direction Rangers are looking to go longer term. So there is continuity and if another manager comes in you don’t have to rip things up and start again.
Rangers’ summer recruitment will already be well under way – Michael and Ross would have worked on it. Michael knows who he wants and will just be looking to get the deals over the line. If he can get the players he wants then there can be no excuses. He can come back stronger next season.
Rangers need to be refreshed and improved – and next season the league needs to be won. How will Wilson’s time at Rangers be looked on? For me, it has been successful. He was sporting director when Rangers won 55 and stopped Celtic from 10-in-a-row.
There was a Scottish Cup win – the first time for 12 years – and a fifth European final. They were possibly just one kick away from the team’s second European trophy.
Ross came in during the Steven Gerrard time when the club were building up to try and be a successful team again. They got the club back in a situation, irrespective how this season goes, where Rangers are competitive again. Ross oversaw a lot of the rebuilding and there have been some successes, like Calvin Bassey and Joe Aribo.
I get the frustrations of the fans who were expecting Rangers to kick on after they won the league. It never quite happened. Celtic, under Ange, came straight back and dominated. I do feel some of the criticism thrown at Ross earlier in the season was harsh because it wasn’t just down to him.
It definitely wouldn’t be a case of Wilson telling Giovanni van Bronckhorst or Gerrard who they would be signing. It would have been a collaboration and it’s the same with Beale over club recruitment. If you go through all of last summer’s signings you could probably pick holes in them all. There have been a couple of summers when the signings weren’t great.
That is what the fans were jumping on. Van Bronckhorst was getting it in the neck then he was replaced. The supporters couldn’t really get on to Michael because, apart from Celtic, he has won the majority of the games. So the finger was pointed at the board and the sporting director.
If Rangers were top of the league then a lot of the fans wouldn’t care about the recruitment. If your team is top of the league it can paper over the cracks. There is no doubt Ross will reflect.
Mistakes have been made but, as a sporting director, it is a job where you are not going to get everything right. I am sure everyone at the club will wish Ross all the best at Nottingham Forest. Rangers now have to move on and make sure any mistakes over the last two summers aren’t repeated again because there has to be a response and the starting XI improved.
