It's doesn’t really matter to Michael Beale what you call it anymore.
It’s only a couple of months since the Rangers boss scoffed at the use of the word rebuild to describe the scale of change required at Ibrox this summer. He reckoned “revamp” was a better way to go after admitting he was still weighing up who he’d be taking with him next year.
Well there is no doubt now that a major squad overhaul is needed after yet another defeat to Celtic on Sunday consigned the Light Blues to a barren campaign. The Londoner even backtracked on his own terminology take after conceding he was preparing to carry out the “biggest rebuild” Gers have seen in years, with a dozen ins and outs now on the horizon. The words may have changed but certainly what hasn’t is the necessity to get it right. Beale knows Rangers cannot afford to repeat the recruitment blunders of last summer that have left them trailing in the wake of Ange Postecoglou’s rampant Hoops.
The time for talking is over, now it’s about acting on his plan for Rangers’ recovery. “Listen, they’re all the same words,” the Ibrox gaffer insisted as it was pointed out he was the man who’d made the distinction between revamp and rebuild.
“I had 24 games [at that point] to go until the end of the season. Come on boys, you have to manage a group of men and their agents hang on every word. In the main, our record of results is good.
"Certain games have really hurt us. In every one of those [Old Firm] games, did we physically have the opportunity to turn the tide, to score or defend better? Yeah, we could.
“Did we use any of them? No, we never, so it’s blunt, it’s sharp, it’s horrible.
“The early part of this week, you can imagine what it was like for everybody – the despair. It’s a season when the group came back off huge emotion of the Scottish Cup and Europe.
“Then they get through [to the Champions League] against PSV. You can imagine where that emotion was but it ends with a new coach and a lot of uncertainty.
“I’m really clear on the vision. Obviously, it will become clearer as the summer moves on and we come back into pre-season and things are announced.
“But you’ve got to do things right by people. There are a lot of players in that dressing room that I’ve had wonderful experiences with. If I’m now having difficult conversations, it’s important I have those conversations in private.
“Then, when the decision has finally been made or it’s the right the moment to release it, you work with that player and the club to make sure it’s done in the correct way. I get that it’s frustrating when I come and sit here [and talk to the Press] but that’s how football works.”
So is the scale of the remedial work, however you want to term it, bigger than he first imagined when he returned to the club in November? “I think the goalposts have moved,” he said. “We’ve played 24 games, I’ve lived with the group a little bit more.
“OK, Celtic are going to end the season having done fantastically well. I still think if you were in the stadium last weekend you saw my team perform well.
“Everyone has an opinion. I’ve got a clear plan and it’s just about executing that now.”
Beale’s team have run Celtic close in the last three derbies, losing each of them by the odd goal - but he’s not hiding from the fact they remain second best. He added: “We are going to tear up a team that lost a semi-final narrowly 1-0 and probably shouldn’t have lost it. That is the reality. That is not good enough, is it?
“I don’t think that team performed too poorly at the weekend. I think [the goal Jota scored] was poor in a moment and another moment was equally as poor [with Fashion Sakala] having the chance to equalise.
“Over the course of the season, we need to show improvement. In the time that I have been here, I have been happy enough. But it is clear that the fans need new faces.
“They have really taken to Todd Cantwell and Nico Raskin and it is important that we recruit strongly. The energy those guys bring in the room, we need people who will come in here bursting with energy to make a difference.”
So it appears it will be all change at Ibrox this summer, with a fresh wind that’s already blown through the boardroom set to sweep down the marble staircase and into the dressing room. The list of high-profile departures from the boardroom now sits at five, with chairman Douglas Park, CEO Stewart Robertson, sporting director Ross Wilson, academy chief Craig Mulholland and director Andrew Dickson all calling it quits.
It’s a major upheaval but the opportunity to start anew on and off the pitch. For Beale - who cut a deflated figure as he sat down to meet the media ahead of tomorrow’s clash with Aberdeen - it’s a glimmer of light to cling to amid the gloom of derby defeat.
He said: “Hugely excited by it. What an exciting time. If the fans want one or two new faces coming, they’re coming in.
“We have won a lot of football games, we’ll come back and finish the season strongly, we’ll have a strong pre-season and go again. There’s an opportunity right at the start of the season to qualify for the Champions League, so there’s a lot to look forward to.
“The recruitment side is a long way down the road and I’m excited by it, energised by it and you will certainly see a new Rangers. But at the moment I still see a team that performs to a decent level.
“It’s been a disappointing season but the quickest way is to recruit well, go away and come back fresh and go again. So I’m excited by the changes at the club and the opportunity it gives us to recruit.”
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