Secret Rangers bat signal triggers Celtic diehards to quit Hotline as broken Bears pounce on Clement the Condemned
Up against it Philippe Clement insists he doesn’t do walking away.
But the furious Rangers faithful are ready to march the beleaguered Belgian straight out the front doors at Ibrox. Sunday’s Scottish Cup shocker at home to Queen’s Park ranks up there alongside Berwick Rangers, Hamilton and Progres Neiderkorn in the club’s worst ever results.
And the punters say it’s the final straw for a boss whose team sit 13 points adrift in the title race just two weeks into February. Jamie Thompson, Yoker, said: “Clement should be sacked on the basis he is not fit or capable of meeting the job requirements as per the expectations laid out in his interview. He should be sacked because his failures have caused serious damage to Rangers Football Club financially and in terms of our progress on the pitch. Enough is enough.”
Stuart McLeod, Stepps, added: “The Scottish Cup defeat to Queen’s Park sums up all that is wrong at Ibrox. A team that made top eight in the Europa league and only a month ago blew the league leaders away in a comfortable 3-0 win has become a team devoid of leadership and desire who have been humbled by Queen’s. The board manager and players have allowed mediocrity to become commonplace. The cull at the club can't come quickly enough.”
Jimmy Mac, Glasgow, raged: “Philipe Clement has no honour as a man nor a manager. Mr Excuses has just recorded one of if not the most humiliating nights in Rangers’ history, beaten by a Scottish second tier team, yet he still has the arrogance to laugh in the face of every Rangers supporter worldwide by stating on live TV he doesn’t fear for his position. Sack Clement now!”
Lifelong supporter Frank Jackson said: “Being 80 years old, I well remember the Berwick result as being a shocker in its time. But this latest shambles is the worst result ever in Rangers’ history. No passion from any of them, no fight but happy to pick up wages that fans can only dream of. Not one of them is fit to wear the shirt.”
Robert Horne emailed: “It's not a case of the Ibrox board sacking Clement, if he had any back bone he would resign. The board extended his contract, why? The team was achieving absolutely zero. The whole system and infrastructure at Rangers is amateurish. Total disgrace for a club of this magnitude.”
Robert Pender said: “It’s a fact that a team can rise no higher than its leaders. The manager always displays negativity. The captain in the tunnel showed a disrespectful arrogance. The board has no grasp on the mood of the supporters. The answer is simple, clear the lot out.”
Clement again tried to explain away Sunday’s disaster by placing it in the context of his Rangers rebuild. But Nick Boyle, New York, reckons the noises coming out of Ibrox sound like a broken record. He said: “Clement said, comically but not ironically, ‘We know it’s a rebuild’. Get a grip Phil. That sad cliche has no more legs. In April 2023, Michael Beale stated Rangers would undergo ‘the biggest rebuild this club has seen in a number of years’.
“In November 2022, the Record reported that ‘Giovanni van Bronckhorst has acknowledged that Rangers could face another major rebuild next summer.’ In January 2021, a BBC headline told us that Steven Gerrard was 'revelling in his Rangers rebuild.’ In 2017, the much-maligned Pedro Caixinha told the world that 'we must rebuild this massive club’. Rangers fans are as sick as a parrot and their manager must face reality: their chances of a return to glory days are as dead as a Norwegian Blue.”
The Ibrox faithful aren’t laughing - but their rivals were lapping up the Spiders’ surprise triumph. Stephen Mulhern, Dumbarton, said: “Queen’s keeper Callum Ferrie produced a masterclass performance to keep Rangers at bay which was a mirror image of the other previous greatest shock in Scottish Cup history when a certain Jock Wallace kept Rangers out when Berwick knocked them out in 1967.
“However, with Ross McCausland saying they can go all the way in the Europa League, they will no doubt be relieved they don’t have to face the calibre of a side like Queen’s Park in the forthcoming rounds.”
Hoops fan Kenny Wilson, Moffat, added: “So this great Rangers team who fans on here still claim to be better than this overrated Celtic team are beaten by the mighty Queen’s Park at home! And knowing how they think, they will still have the brass neck to mock us if we get beat by Bayern on Wednesday night! They should be stopping their obsession with Celtic and worry about their own team. Another Treble incoming.”
James Brown, Glasgow, added: “As Chris Lowe is forever giving us his transfer valuation of numerous Celtic players, would he now provide us with his transfer valuations of the Queens Park heroes who dumped his Ibrox side out of the Cup in their ain midden?”
Hibee Neil Renton, Leith, said: “Rangers massively underestimated Queen’s Park and paid the price for doing so. Big clubs like Hibs had a tricky tie and Ayr United but put in a professional display to win the tie. Rangers’ problem was they thought they were already in the next round and now they’re out.”
Meanwhile, Gary Stevenson, Newtonhill, said: “Now that Michael Stewart has got his wish and Rangers are out of the Scottish Cup, he will hopefully learn why he does not get the commentary on the big games. The bias he shows against Rangers is unbelievable. I have to give credit to Queens Park who showed us how to get a victory against the odds. Rangers don't need nobodies like Stewart and his criticism. It's little wonder that Ally McCoist gets all the big gigs to commentate on.”
