Kevin Drinkell hopes Rangers players still hurt like hell from losing the league after one season as title heroes. Because he knows that was the feeling that fired the Ibrox club back to the top when he signed for them.
Drinks, a £600,000 buy from Norwich, arrived for pre-season in 1988 to find a team fuming with themselves. The bulk of Graeme Souness ’ squad secured the club a first league crown in nine years in 1986-87. But Celtic snatched back the prize straight away under Billy McNeill to celebrate their centenary year in style.
The current Ibrox crop endured something similar. They romped to Premiership glory with Steven Gerrard to end the club’s top rank exile. Yet despite a wonderful European campaign, Gers relinquished their title to Ange Postecoglou’s Celts. Giovanni van Bronckhorst gathered his men for pre-season training with long-serving stars Connor Goldson, Allan McGregor, Steven Davis and Scott Arfield still in position. Drinkell hopes they spell out a similar message to the one from Souness and his senior stars 34 years ago – that ‘one and done’ is not a good look for Rangers and second or third best won’t be tolerated again.
