When Steven Gerrard left Rangers in the lurch, they were top of the league and, seemingly, heading for a second consecutive Scottish Premiership title.
The truth is that the Light Blues never really got going in the 2021/22 campaign other than a Europa League run that was night and day to what was being seen on a Saturday or Sunday.
The squad only had a few changes with a £25m Covid-19 caused loss affecting the transfer budget with fans having only just returned to Ibrox.
Rangers don’t need a return to Steven Gerrard ways
Since then, the feeling in the support is that it has been down hill ever since, but are fans looking back on the Gerrard era with blue-tinted glasses due to the dominance from across the city?
Cast your mind back to March 2020, the world was an uncertain place, as was the future of Steven Gerrard after just losing 1-0 at home to Hamilton and to bottom-placed Hearts in the Scottish Cup.
But for the Covid enforced absence, there are serious doubts that Gerrard would have stayed at Rangers, as his own words after the Hearts defeat revealed:
“I need to think hard about where we are at as a group. I need to do some real, serious thinking in the next 24, 48 hours. I am feeling pain right now because I want to win here, I am desperate to win here.
“Looking from the side today, I didn’t get the impression that the feeling amongst my players was the same. The performance was nowhere near good enough.”
At that point in time, Rangers were 13 points behind Celtic with a game in hand and nine games to go after a post-winter break collapse.
The season before had been a similar story with Celtic only needing a point more than Rangers got in 2023/24 to win the league as nine games were drawn and six games lost.
Even the season that Rangers won the league with an invincible campaign, both cup competitions saw shock exits with Celtic already out and the trophies already seemingly heading to Ibrox.
Much has been made of the tactics of recent managers.
Michael Beale was expected to play a similar shape to the one that had been seen under Gerrard but chopped and changed and ended up looking shapeless and clueless.
Giovanni van Bronckhorst and Philippe Clement share that they are pragmatists and will adapt tactical plans depending on the opposition – sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.
They have something else in common, lengthy injury lists.
Rangers don’t need a style of play, they need to win
The last few seasons have seen fans demanding to see a style of play.
Gerrard had a style of play, however, he frequently struggled against Aberdeen, Kilmarnock and any other team that sat 11 men behind the ball.
The much vaunted 4-3-3 out of possession shape worked well in Europe and Old Firm derbies but was almost irrelevant in every other domestic game.
What fans really want is to see their team win.
The reality is fans weren’t praising Gerrard’s shape and system in 2018/19 or 2019/20 or even in 2021/22 despite being top of the league.
They praised it in 2021/22, why? Because Rangers were winning.
There were no questions about Clement’s style or game plan or competence as a coach when he dragged Rangers to the top of the league last season with an injury list in double figures or without his best forward line.
Or when he won the league cup or topped the Europa League group with good results against Sparta Prague, and Real Betis.
Clement isn’t perfect, however, whether it is 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3, it won’t make a difference until the players do their bit, mark runners, be braver in possession take their chances and don’t bend over to pull their socks up when an opposition player is running in behind.
