Club Brugge boss gets it spot on with what he’s said about Russell Martin at Rangers
Rangers take on Club Brugge in the second leg of the Champions League playoff round on Wednesday, and Russell Martin needs a miracle result.
Club Brugge lead Rangers 3-1 after a well-deserved first-leg victory at Ibrox. That means Rangers must win by at least two goals to remain in the tie after 90 minutes.
The victory is crucial, not only for Rangers to qualify for the Champions League group stage, but also to gain some much-needed credit in the bank for Martin.
After failing to win any of his first three Scottish Premiership games, Martin is already facing calls to be sacked by Rangers.
Club Brugge boss Nicky Hayen delivers verdict on Rangers boss Russell Martin
Rangers were guilty of some individual errors against Club Brugge to give their opponents an early advantage in this tie.
This is something that Martin can do little to prevent. Indeed, the former Southampton boss has argued that there are many issues at Rangers that will take time to fix.
In his pre-match interview before the second leg, Club Brugge manager Nicky Hayen agreed that Martin will need time to turn things around at Rangers.
However, he admitted that Martin would “need results” to ensure he gets that time.
He said: “It takes time, but in a top club – and we see it also with us – you don’t have the time to build. You need results, and then it depends how calm the board is if they give you the time to build or not.”
Russell Martin needs his team to do the talking on the pitch
Hayen was spot on with his assessment of the situation at Rangers.
Martin needs some big results in the next few weeks because the Rangers fanbase won’t accept a run of form like this for much longer.
That’s just the way it goes at Rangers.
Martin’s team have already
- Dropped points in three consecutive league games
- Almost thrown away huge leads in the previous two Champions League ties
- Given themselves a mountain to climb in this important tie against Brugge.
The manager has spoken reasonably calmly about why it’ll take time to reset the culture at Rangers. He’s certainly an accomplished speaker.
But he needs his team to start doing the talking for him out on the pitch. A goal is worth a thousand words.
It would be a momentous achievement if Rangers can turn around this two-goal deficit in Belgium, but that’s the sort of accomplishment that may be needed to get the fans back onside.
Sign up for the Ibrox News WhatsApp channel and turn on notifications to have all the latest, breaking Rangers news sent straight to your phone.