Barry Ferguson offers instant Rangers advice to Philippe Clement
Barry Ferguson has offered Philippe Clement an instant piece of advice following his appointment at Rangers, telling the Belgian he must “start winning.”
The former Monaco boss was announced as Michael Beale’s successor at Ibrox on Sunday (15 October) after two weeks of shortlisting and interviews saw him and former defender Kevin Muscat the final two candidates in the race.
Having taken his first day of training on Monday (16 October) Clement is building up to his Ibrox debut when the Light Blues face Hibernian in front of their home crowd on Saturday (21 October) and Ferguson has given the new manager a very simple piece of advice.
Speaking on the Go Radio Football Show on Monday (16 October) he said: “Start winning as quickly as possible, it’s pretty basic. He’ll understand the demands that are put on him straight away and the Rangers fans that are going to the game this Saturday at Ibrox will be demanding that he gets three points.
“It’ll be really interesting to see how he kicks off his campaign on Saturday but I’m sure every Rangers fan that goes to the game on Saturday will be right behind him because it’s been a tough period for Rangers in terms of trophies.
“That’s one thing that Philippe Clement will have to start doing quickly and as Mark pointed out he’s got a brilliant opportunity, he’s got a semi-final next month at Hampden. He needs to make sure they’re in that final and he needs to make sure that on 17 December that trophy is coming back to Ibrox. “
Perfect opportunity
Both Michael O’Neill and now Ferguson have perhaps offered Clement possibly the most obvious but also true piece of advice they possibly could following his appointment at Ibrox, as ultimately, anything less than winning is seen as a failure on the blue side of Glasgow.
It will be a tough ask for the new Gers manager to breathe new life into the Light Blues’ title hopes as they are already trailing Celtic by seven points, but there is always hope that a few good results could close that gap, especially in Old Firm matches.
Clement has the perfect opportunity to show that he is the man for the job with the Viaplay Cup final only a few months away and ultimately the Belgian only has to win two matches in that competition to lift his first piece of silverware and better Beale’s trophy haul.
But that also means he has the chance to get off to a terrible start as should Rangers fail to win the cup on 17 December, fans and pundits will immediately turn to their new manager and wonder if he is cut out for this job, just as they did with Beale at the beginning of this season.
Clement cannot let this good opportunity pass him by so early in his Ibrox career.
In other Rangers news, Simon Jordan has slammed the Rangers board describing them as “the blind leading the deaf.”