Michael Beale's Ibrox exile lasted a year down south before the lure of Rangers hauled him back to Glasgow.
And in that time at Aston Villa and QPR, if he hadn’t been obsessed with keeping in touch with the fortunes of his former club, he’d have struggled to know how they were doing. Scottish football coverage is practically non-existent south of Hadrian’s Wall and Beale believes that’s all the more reason for those who are involved in the game up here to shout about it from rooftops.
Not ignore a third v second clash under the lights at a full-house Tynecastle as was done by Sky on Wednesday night. Not moan at players for celebrating goals, as was done in the direction of Alfredo Morelos in the same game. Beale has watched Celtic bring top class Japanese players to these shores. Hearts have brought in World Cup stars and his own team has added Todd Cantwell and now Belgian U21 international Nico Raskin to a squad already bristling with talent. He believes those positives should be promoted and he doesn’t see many signs of it.
As he prepared to try to stretch his unbeaten run since returning to 12 games when Ross County come calling tomorrow, Beale said: “At this moment in time, Scottish football is really colourful. We’ve got players coming in from outside, whether that’s from down south, or from Asia and one or two from around Europe. The league’s in a really good place, so we should focus on the football.
“It was disappointing that game wasn’t on TV. You have two teams unbeaten over 10 games and something that had to give.
"There was optimism in the air in the Hearts team and maybe in general in football with people saying, ‘okay, let’s see where Rangers are at’ and I thought it was always going to be a good game. It’s not so much in the media down there.
"It’s not until you come up here that you realise it’s a real goldfish bowl. That’s why people talk about it.
“I was following Rangers because I spent a lot of time here, but you don’t read a lot about it in the media and I think the achievements of the team in Europe can be easily dismissed and that’s disappointing. That’s why I say we have to promote our game because nobody outside of our shores will do it.
"We’ve got good players in the league, players who have gone out of our league and done really well. Maybe we need to talk our game up a little bit.
"I always feel we are a bit glass half empty rather than glass half full when we talk about football. I think we can talk up our game much better than we do.”
Cantwell is one of his players who has hit the ground running and he is hoping that Raskin, signed from Standard Liege and just awaiting international clearance, can make the same impact.
But the midfielder, he insists, has not been guaranteed a place in the team and Beale reckons his fight with Glen Kamara for a jersey will be well worth watching in the coming days, weeks and months.
He added: “He’s very different to Todd. I played against him in his last start for Norwich, so I’d visually seen him.
“I haven’t seen Nicolas in a stadium since he played against us a couple of years back. But he was a player, when we were here before, that we were very interested in.
“And when I came back, he was one of the first names mentioned to me. Straight away, in my very first conversation with Rangers, he was a player that the club was very interested in and what were my thoughts. I said I really liked him.
“I don’t want to put these two players in competition but he and Glen are going to have a massive tussle to play in a similar role, They can play together, for sure, but they are very similar. Raskin is not a tough man.
"He’s not a tackler, he’s a technical player like Glen, he’ll intercept and run hard but he’s not a little Rottweiler. He can play as a 6 or an 8 and can dribble with the ball and has a good passing range.
“Then it’s just a matter of settling in. At 21, he’s got all his future in front of him.”
Asked if he felt it was a coup to land a much wanted player, Beale answered: “It was huge we got to the Europa League final last year. Absolutely huge.
“People look at that and go: “Wow”. I know the Champions League run didn’t go well this year for whatever reason.
“But to play in a Europa League final and then go in the Champions League opens you up to a different level of player. If I think of the players from when I first arrived in 2018, it shows the progress of the club.
“Sometimes I feel the only people who understand that and respect it are the ones inside the building who have gone on that journey.
“Then I think it’s about having a real clear vision of where we’re going in the future. I’d like to re-energise the age of the squad – and the hunger. I’m seeing good signs at the moment.
“If you look at Nico and Malik at 20, 21, Cantwell at 24, Matondo who will come again at 21, the age of the group is starting to look good,
“I’m really pleased with Alex Lowry and that he’s decided to stay rather than take one or two of the loans that were put in front of him. He came on at Tynecastle and looked like a good player again.
“When the team is playing well, it allows all these players to flourish, doesn’t it?”
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