Rangers Face Challenges with New Manager and Signings

Rangers’ new regime walked into the room with nine signings already on the books, a new manager in the dugout and a fanbase demanding lift-off. The league table, and Europe, tell a very different story.

One point from two Scottish Premiership games. A 2-1 deficit to Jagiellonia Bialystok after the first leg of their Europa League third qualifying round. For a club that built its modern identity on relentless winning, this is not the script anyone at Ibrox had in mind.

‘Clunky’ business and a restless start

Chairman Andrew Cavenagh did not try to sugar-coat it. Addressing shareholders at an open forum in Glasgow, he described Rangers’ transfer business so far as “clunky” and admitted results are not where he wants them.

There is, he insisted, more to come.

“I don’t like putting a number on it,” he said, “but certainly I’d hope three to five more players are coming in and a number will possibly go out.”

Nine have arrived already, yet the team under Derek McInnes has stumbled out of the blocks. The sense of a squad still under construction hangs over every performance. The board know it, the manager feels it, and the support can see it.

The problem? The season will not wait.

“It sucks that we have to play a number of important games before the window closes but that’s how it works,” Cavenagh admitted. The timing is brutal: key European qualifiers, early league fixtures, all while Rangers try to reshape a dressing room that has been conditioned, as he put it, to accept finishing second – or worse.

“When we came in around a year ago, our ambition was sustained winning and winning sustainably,” he said. “I understand we’re not there yet; I’m more optimistic now than I was a year ago.

“We could look at how things have gone in the first three games and sit here and sulk, but we’re not going to do that.

“When we came in, we realised finishing second and sometimes worse, was seeping into every corner of this club and we had to change that, but it takes time.”

Time, though, is rarely a luxury afforded to Rangers managers or boards.

McInnes, front-foot football and a culture reset

Beside Cavenagh sat chief executive Jim Gillespie and shareholder Paraag Marathe, fielding questions that cut straight to the heart of the project: why Derek McInnes, and what exactly are Rangers trying to be?

McInnes arrived off the back of pushing Heart of Midlothian to the brink of a title last season, only to fall just short. His appointment signalled a clear stylistic choice.

“You can go for a Pep [Guardiola] style manager or a [Jurgen] Klopp style manager – we wanted a Klopp-style manager who plays on the front foot,” Gillespie said. “Derek has been high on our list for a long time and we think he fits the style and culture of this club.”

It is an ambitious comparison. Klopp-style football demands intensity, cohesion and absolute buy-in. It can look thrilling once the pieces click, chaotic while they are still being moved around the board.

Right now, Rangers are in that in-between phase: aggressive intentions, uneven execution, and a league campaign already wobbling.

The pressure will only grow if the Europa League campaign ends before it truly begins. Rangers host Jagiellonia in the second leg on Thursday, chasing a 2-1 deficit with the carrot of a play-off against either Larne or Iberia Tbilisi. The stakes are obvious – financially, reputationally, emotionally.

Win, and the narrative shifts. Lose, and the questions around recruitment, timing and direction sharpen dramatically.

VAR anger and a demand for answers

If the boardroom wanted a quiet week to bed in their ideas, Sunday’s 2-1 defeat to Hibernian did not oblige. The VAR decision that led to Hibs’ penalty has become another flashpoint.

Gillespie confirmed Rangers have gone to the SFA for clarification on the call.

“It was my understanding that it has to be a clear and obvious error for the referee to be called over,” he said. “I didn’t see that as either clear or obvious.

“We need a strategy for developing referees and VAR.

“My question for the SFA would be ‘what is the strategy for improvement?’ – we have to get improvement.”

This was not the language of a club content to grumble privately. It was a direct challenge to the governing body’s standards and processes, framed as part of a broader demand for accountability.

A club in transition, a season already biting

Strip it back and the picture is stark. A new chairman, a new manager, heavy squad churn, and a declared mission to rip out a culture that tolerated coming second. All of it colliding with a slow start, a European tie in the balance and refereeing controversies swirling around them.

Cavenagh insists he is more optimistic than he was a year ago. He believes the club is moving towards “sustained winning and winning sustainably.” The recruitment drive is not over. The tactical identity is still being embedded. The mindset, he argues, is changing.

The reality, though, will be decided on the pitch in the coming weeks. Three to five more signings may arrive. Systems may bed in. Decisions may or may not go their way.

What cannot be delayed is the answer to the only question that really matters at Ibrox: can this version of Rangers start winning, and keep winning, before the season runs away from them?