A coat, a screwdriver and a loose peg … with some madeira cake thrown in

I’ll tell ye one thing. Alex McLeish or no Alex McLeish, in anticipating another European night at Ibrox, I bet there’s hardly one of you Bears out there even fantasising about a Rangers wakover. Plenty of you may be fully expecting The Teds to progress by the end of the evening but even the most optimistic of Bluenoses are all expecting to be hitting the nearest nail bar first thing on Friday morning.

We just don’t do easy these days, do we. Well, very rarely. Sturm Graz 5-0, PSV 4-1 - och aye, happy nights - but even those resuts came in the context of a group stage in which we we ended up failing, and in a manner which cost us all no end of sweat (Lucky I can afford to lose a few pounds!).

We gubbed NK Maribor home and away in a qualifier a few years ago - but that only led us to a play-off with Fenerbache which went right down to the wire in Istanbul and saw us papped oot before it really counted.

As far as The Rangers are concerned, the moment it gets to the tickly bit, there’s never a comprehensive night at Ibrox. Even when we gubbed Alania Vladikavkaz over two Champions league qualifying legs, the first-leg 3-1 win was achieved only with a penalty save from God Goram and after the concession of an away goal before Coisty and co got going. We went over to Russia thinking we might live to regret that one we let in.

And - you knew I was coming to this, didn’t you - we ALWAYS let one in at The Brox. Typically, it would serve me right if we keep a clean sheet against Maritimo … and go out 0-1 on aggregate. But I’d love to see an overall victory with “Rangers … something, Maritimo .. NIL” as the second leg scoreline.

Eck has a terrible record in Europe - his Rangers have never kept a clean sheet at home or away, but getting us through to this group stage of the Uefa Cup will go a hell of a long way to saving his job. If he does that, he then has two quick pots at celtic in little over a month’s tme to help restore himself fully in the eyes of the Gers support and, even if he can’t fully shake off the dangley Celtic bogey , the new five-team group set-up in Europe’s second tournament allows him the chance to gain compensatory kudos elsewhere.

The visible relief of the players on Sunday when Novo got the first goal, led to an instant second goal and a general loosening up of inhibitions made all the more apperent in their immediate absence. If big Prso’s playing against the Portuegese then I think we’ll see Novo and he take the new invigorated esprit de corps into this crucial tie and transform it into a magical night. I feel the team may just have been waiting for something to click and that click took place in teh last twelve minutes at Dens - Novo will make up for what happened in Madeira by grabbing a hat-trick and suddenly the season is salvageable. CSKA were our Zizkov this time, perhaps (See they’ve done not too bad against porto and PSG in the Champions League - couldn’thave been that bad a side, eh!) - a better result in the long run.

OR … OR … OR … Sunday, like last Wednesday and the previous Sunday, was just Rangers playing generally badly but eeking out wins against shite SPL nobodies and Maritimo, sitting deep and hitting on the break as suits them, will soak us up and pick us off. And it’ll be a new manager for October.

So it’s either 3-1 Rangers or 2-0 Maritimo on the night. Although I have a funny feeling for 5-0 Rangers or 2-1 Rangers. Whatever happens - we lose an away goal. But if either of my optimistic sides is right, McLeish gets a pass til November at least. And he’ll have earned it.

Good luck to Hearts in Braga too.

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Published:
09.29.04 / 10pm
Category:
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