Rangers two European finals in 2008 and 2022 are nothing short of miraculous when you consider the modern day gulf in finances between the top five leagues and those, like Man City, at the top of the football food chain.
There was a time though, before the Champions League was all about a select handful of clubs, that the Ibrox outfit could compete with the richest clubs in Europe, not only that, we were one of them.
An incredible bit of research by Scotland’s Coefficient on X shows exactly where Rangers at the top table of European football, a table Man City were feeding off the scraps from 30 years ago.
Rangers have European reality after Man City revenue results
Rangers season in 1992/93 will be many fans’ favourite, for those of us who are old enough to remember that is.
A team stacked with legends and players who refused to accept defeat saw a 44-game unbeaten run include a campaign in the inaugural Champions League that then club secretary Campbell Ogilvie was, ironically, pivotal in creating.
The infamous “Battle of Britain” saw Rangers beat current English champions Leeds Utd home and away to seal a place in the first ever group stages of the new European Cup.
Going head to head with Marseille in the groups was never going to be easy but Rangers remained unbeaten at the end of the campaign and just one goal away from the Champions League final with AC Milan.
We all know how the story goes from here and the subsequent fall out but it seemed, at the time, that we would go again the following year.
Unfortunately, this is the closest we got and closest we will ever get looking at the numbers.
Rangers revenue and the modern day gap to Man City
In ‘92/93, Rangers sat only behind Manchester United in terms of revenue and were on a par in terms of wage bill too at the top of the British football finance table.
For ‘22/23, things are entirely different with Rangers some £640m in revenue behind Man City and over £350m in wages, European football is an entirely different game now.
It’s not an excuse of not being able to compete but what it does show is how limited we are in Scottish football and how far we have fallen behind.
Rangers used to beat clubs like Man Utd and Man City for players, now, we couldn’t even afford their academy players if Philippe Clement wanted to add them to his squad.
