By Alistair Aird
It is fair to say that the followers of Rangers Football Club haven’t had to go too far lately when seeking their troubles. Although there was the elation of a European final in 2022, three major domestic honours since the return to top flight football in 2016 has cut to the quick. It simply hasn’t been acceptable. The club has been riding on a managerial merry-go-round for almost 10 years and the latest man charged with restoring stability and delivering silverware is Russell Martin. His appointment has polarised opinion, so are there any positives that can be gleaned or will Martin soon be cast adrift like many that have gone before him?
Since the ‘journey’ through the lower leagues ended with a Premiership return in 2016, excluding caretakers like Jimmy Nicholl and Steven Davis, EIGHT managers have sat in the hottest of hotseats.
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Mark Warburton, with the mantra of implementing Plan A or indeed doing Plan A better, lasted until January 2017 before he departed to take over at Nottingham Forest. Warburton was in charge for 82 matches, but 50 of those came in season 2015/16 when Rangers were in the Championship. Before he departed, his win rate in the top flight was 50% – 12 wins from 24 games – with his Rangers side scoring 32 goals and conceding 26. Among the five losses were thumping defeats at Parkhead (5-1) and Tynecastle (4-1).
A gymnastic Graeme Murty took temporary charge until Pedro Caixinha took the helm, but the Portuguese managed to plumb unimaginable depths that included a humiliating loss in Luxembourg and a 5-1 thrashing in an Old Firm game at Ibrox. His side won just 14 of the 26 matches (53.85%) they contested, scoring 49 goals and conceding 30.
Murty was summoned once again when Caixinha was dismissed early in season 2017/18, but his time was up after two Old Firm games that saw no goals scored and nine conceded. Statistically, if you exclude his spell as caretaker, Murty oversaw 18 wins, two draws and nine defeats. Rangers scored 61 goals and conceded 38. That’s a win rate of 62.07%.
The appointment of Steven Gerrard in May 2018 steadied a listing ship. Admittedly, he won only one of nine major domestic trophies contested before he left in November 2021, but Gerrard’s aura helped to galvanise the club. Celtic feared us for the first time in a long while. And it was the same in the European arena, with Gerrard moulding a side that few relished facing. His record as Rangers manager was 124 wins from 192 matches (64.58%) with 407 goals scored and 139 conceded. The latter equates to a goal conceded every 124.32 minutes.
After not being given the tools to fix the roof when the sun was shining, Gerrard left and Giovanni van Bronckhorst took over. A capitulation at Parkhead didn’t help his cause, but that was forgiven as his side swatted aside some of the crème de la crème in Europe to reach the Europa League final in Seville. That ended in heartache as did the race to retain the league title, but the Dutchman did lead Rangers to the Scottish Cup.
A disastrous Champions League campaign, a catalogue of injuries and an uneven start in the title race cost van Bronckhorst his job, though, and he left winning 42 of his 68 matches in charge (61.76%).
In his place came the supposed ‘brains’ behind Gerrard, Michael Beale. We were promised forwards wreaking havoc and the handbrake being let off, but that never came to pass. Beale’s brand of torpid football eventually created a toxicity at Ibrox and he was gone by the end of October 2024. Yet of all the managers we have had in the last decade, Beale has the highest win percentage, 31 victories from 43 matches equating to 72.09%.
A bald and seemingly bold Belgian followed in Beale’s footsteps. Philippe Clement appeared set to restore the glory days. A League Cup win within weeks of his arrival was a positive step and at one point it looked as if Rangers would go from terrible to Treble. But with silverware in sight, they stumbled on the home straight and never fully recovered. A woeful start to season 2023/24 was compounded by a historic loss at home to Queens Park in the Scottish Cup. Clement was gone with a record that showed 82 goals conceded in 86 matches and a win rate of 63.95%.
Barry Ferguson was a surprise appointment as an interim head coach. He brought passion and pride back but also oversaw a catastrophic run of defeats at Ibrox. Ferguson did what he was brought in to do – stabilise – but he was never going to be the man to take Rangers forward when the new investment came in via the 49ers takeover. He left after taking charge for 15 matches that witnessed 26 goals conceded and only 32 scored. Ferguson’s win rate was 40%.
So, on the day that our new head coach, Russell Martin, was announced, what am I trying to get at here?
The first thing is that stats mean next to nothing which is hard to swallow for a guy that likes to dabble in statistical analysis. That’s why Martin’s win rate of 39.28% – 99 victories from 252 matches as a manager – shouldn’t be a stick to beat him too hard with. It’s not magnificent by any stretch of the imagination, but there have been flickers of potential over the course of his three managerial appointments.
After a playing career that spanned 16 years, almost 600 appearances and six clubs, Martin took on his first managerial appointment in November 2019 when he took over from Paul Tisdale at MK Dons.
Praised for his progressive, possession-based style of play, Martin’s side clocked up the most touches in the opposition box than any other team in League One in season 2020/21. Only Barcelona and Manchester City enjoyed more possession of the football over the course of the campaign in Europe too. But to reinforce the point that stats mean very little, MK Dons finished 13th on the league ladder after losing 17 of their 46 games. They were nine points worse off than Oxford United who finished in the last of the play-off places.
But Swansea City seemed suitably impressed and appointed Martin as their head coach in August 2021. A notable achievement in his debut season was a double derby win over Cardiff City – the first time this had ever been achieved – but finishing 15th, 14 points adrift of the play-offs suggested room for improvement. In fairness, that did come, with Swansea finishing 10th in season 2022/23, just three points shy of Sunderland who finished in the last of the play-off spots.
Southampton were the next side to try and derive success from the Martin mantra and they got that, achieving promotion to the Premiership via the play-offs in season 2023/24. Admittedly, it was a patchy season. After winning three of their first four league matches, Southampton lost four on the spin before embarking on a 22-match unbeaten run that featured 16 wins and six draws. But they ended the season losing seven of their final 16 fixtures. But a 1-0 win over Leeds United at Wembley secured the opportunity to dine at English Football’s top table.
However, it was far from a fine dining experience. Southampton registered just a solitary win in their opening 16 matches and Martin, who at one point had adopted a system that included two wide players but no centre forward, was dismissed after a 5-0 thrashing from Spurs.
It’s hardly a stellar CV, but we must focus on the positives. At Swansea, Martin clearly made improvements and came close to getting a shot at the Premiership within two years of taking charge of The Swans. And that’s in one of the most competitive leagues in Europe. The standard in the English Championship is high so it’s no mean feat to have done what he did in Wales and also at Southampton.
Martin’s sides also have an identity, a style of play that features intensity and a focus on winning football matches. He said at much at his press conference. We have been there before – Beale’s ‘forwards wreaking havoc’ and playing with the ‘handbrake off’ at his unveiling is a prime example – so we must hope that Martin’s talk isn’t as cheap.
The second thing that comes from the analysis of the last decade is that we have had a habit of pressing the panic button too readily. Martin is our 20th permanent manager/head coach. The fact that of the previous six only Gerrard has been in charge for more than 100 matches is a stark illustration of the lack of patience. But when you starve a club like Rangers of success, still waters become turbulent and trigger fingers get incredibly itchy.
The sense of underwhelming surrounding the appointment of Martin means that that itchiness won’t be long in coming back. But with a new era ushered in on the wave of fresh investment, I think we need to afford Martin time. After all, we did it with Gerrard, who despite elevating us in Europe won nothing in his first two seasons at the club. I’m not saying that Martin has the same allure, presence or stature that Gerrard did – Stevie was my man for the job from the get-go after all – but if we can see progress on the pitch in the first few weeks and months, then we must get behind that.
Martin follows in illustrious footsteps. He joins Scot Symon, Willie Thornton, Willie Waddell, John Greig, Tommy McLean, Graeme Souness, Ian Durrant, Ally McCoist Stuart McCall, Jimmy Nicholl, Steven Davis and Barry Ferguson in a select group of men that have both played for and managed Rangers. And he has work to do to convince a large percentage of the fanbase that he is the man to challenge Celtic’s supposed supremacy. The tolerance scale dipped into negative numbers a long time ago after all. Group stage European football and a statement-of-intent Old Firm win in the opening weeks of the season will be seen as a minimum for many.
But as apathetic as some have been, we must put our faith in the man and the new incumbents on the board. It took what seemed like an inordinate amount of time to reach a decision on the appointment so in their opinion, Russell Kenneth Alexander Martin is the man to spearhead the voyage into a new, exciting and successful era.
I will get behind the manager and back him to deliver, but I remain something of a doubting Thomas. Like my fellow supporters, I crave success and a return to the days of my youth when success and silverware were a staple. Will Russell Martin be the man to do that? He’s talking the talk so let’s now see if he and his team can walk the walk.