Professional football comes with its fair share of tired cliches. One that gets repeated ad nauseam is that clubs, no matter how dire their results, simply cannot keep changing managers over and over again. This is a sentiment often directed at Rangers, especially now, as yet another campaign teeters on the brink of disaster.
Another common refrain about Rangers is the need to remember the mess they were in back in October when Danny Rohl first took over as head coach. The worrying part is that the person harping on about this more than anyone else right now seems to be Rohl himself.
The German appeared subdued when previewing this Bank Holiday blockbuster, which sees Celtic travel to Hibs later today and Hearts host his Rangers side at Tynecastle tomorrow. It might be an exaggeration to suggest he looks like a man preparing for the gallows, but he certainly hasn't been the cheeky character who set the tone for the last Old Firm derby by questioning why Celtic didn't try to win by more than one goal away to VfB Stuttgart in Europe — only to watch his own team bottle a 2-0 half-time lead at home to their city rivals.
Notably, he refused to answer when asked during his Friday media duties how he assesses his own performance as Rangers manager. He says that is not his job. He expressed the view that it will take four more good games before he can determine if the board is happy with him. And he is spot-on there. Defeat to Motherwell last week has put Rohl's future firmly under the microscope.
Rohl has certainly been a different kind of figurehead compared to many of his predecessors. A calmer presence, a decent guy. More like what is required. Michael Beale and Russell Martin were full of nonsense. God help the next generation of up-and-coming coaches at the Welsh FA if Martin is the one booked to give them a tactical masterclass at their National Conference later this month. Philippe Clement, who initially came across as a welcome voice of reason, ended up babbling nonsense and doing odd press conferences by the end of his tenure. You will hear the odd person pointing to the job the Belgian has been doing at Norwich City and praising his credentials, but the harsh reality is that he blew a league title from a hugely advantageous position in Glasgow and then saw his team knocked out of the Scottish Cup at home to Queen's Park.
Those managers who got the sack at Ibrox fully deserved it. And Rohl will have a hard job avoiding the same fate if this campaign collapses like a poorly made souffle over the next week or so. Yes, he did well to turn things around after the catastrophe of Martin's short reign and get Rangers back into the title race, but that is old news now. Rohl has been unable to get the better of Celtic's veteran manager Martin O'Neill.
Rangers put themselves in a brilliant position, just two points behind Hearts, when beating Derek McInnes' side 4-2 in mid-February. The board had also given him £10 million to spend on Ryan Naderi, Tuur Rommens, and Tochi Chukwuani, as well as financing a loan deal for the disappointing Andreas Skov Olsen. Since then, they have drawn at Livi, let slip a two-goal lead at home to Celtic, and lost at home to Motherwell with a squad that has had well in excess of £40 million spent on it since last summer. They have won just seven of their last 14 games in all competitions, and one of those was a revenge victory against Queen's Park in the cup. Moreover, they have slipped back into the dangerous habit of conceding goals like there is no tomorrow.
In addressing what lies ahead for Rohl — and what should happen to him if this goes wrong — it is important to state what exactly is at stake for Rangers right now. This is no ordinary title race. The stakes are extraordinarily high. It has the potential to change the entire face of the game in Scotland. With Olympiacos unlikely to catch AEK at the top of the Greek Super League and Shakhtar Donetsk almost certain to go out of the Europa Conference League to Crystal Palace, Rangers' coefficient has them in line to go straight into the group stage of the Champions League if they win the Premiership. That is huge. It is worth £40 million just for starters. It also makes life more difficult for Celtic as they figure out how to finance a root-and-branch rebuild and prevents Hearts from having a crack at accessing the kind of money that would turbo-charge the revolution already under way with Jamestown Analytics and investor Tony Bloom.
This can be a real turning point for Rangers. So much is on the line. Yet, ahead of their trip to Gorgie and next Sunday's away fixture at Celtic Park, they do not look like champions-in-waiting. They got schooled at home last weekend in a must-win game by a Motherwell side that cost the equivalent of a few scratchcards and had picked up one point out of 15. They seem utterly incapable of putting together a coherent performance over an entire 90 minutes when it matters. There are serious questions to be asked about Rohl's judgment, too. He got his team wrong against Motherwell. His substitutions often leave you baffled. He stuck with the defence he has during January when it was clear there were flaws. It is time up for Jack Butland in goal. James Tavernier at least admits his time is up. Lord knows what Derek Cornelius has done, but Nasser Djiga at centre-back is not the answer to anything. Forgive those of us who are not buying into the narrative that Manny Fernandez is the next Franco Baresi.
Rangers need to win this title. The fact Martin O'Neill was invited back to the Celtic dugout not once but twice this season shows just how absurd and dysfunctional their season has been and what a mess the place is. As of this moment, Rohl has had three cracks at a 74-year-old OAP who had been out of the game for six years before this term and cannot beat him. We are not here to denigrate Hearts either. This publication has stated from the start of the season that they have what it takes to take the crown in this most unusual of campaigns. And they still do. Yet, they have a fraction of Rangers' budget. Everything still has to be done within strict parameters. There was no £10 million-plus for them to spend in the January window.
Rohl has been backed to the hilt. He has got to deliver something against a Celtic outfit that is a total mess behind the scenes and a Hearts set-up that is not in the same ballpark financially. Yeah, that is harsh. But that is football when so much is at stake. Ask Liam Rosenior. Or Ange Postecoglou with his Europa League winner's medal from Spurs. Or any number of sacked top-level bosses who leave with their pockets full no matter how bad a job they have done. It is the name of the game. Those who drone on about how coaches need time and space and endless money to finance their projects are either coaches themselves or sycophants who feel that asking well-remunerated people to deliver results is somehow populist or unrefined. Football is a results game. Not a tea dance. It is totally, utterly ruthless. And if Rohl loses to Hearts tomorrow to slide seven points behind them with three games to go, or blows it totally at Parkhead in seven days' time, it has got to be curtains.
