Judgment week for Gers boss in 2 huge fixtures

FOR Pedro Caixinha the moment of truth has arrived.

If failing to win a first Glasgow derby of the season on Friday night was not ominous enough then the prospect of dealing with another two of them in the space of five days ought to have the Portuguese manager reaching for the panic pills.

And yet, even though Celtic are now appearing on his horizon smacking their lips with bad intentions, the man in charge of Rangers seems surprisingly serene.

It’s almost as if he doesn’t quite understand what’s about to come his way but Caixinha has been here long enough by now to realise his own credibility – and perhaps even a great deal more than that – is about to go on the line.

And for that reason it would seem like a mistake for Caixinha to take the faith of his superiors – and of chairman Dave King in particular – for granted.

He has tested their patience a little too often during his first six months in the job and King has already displayed his ruthless side in the manner with which he oxtered Mark Warburton out of the back door earlier this year.

Now would not seem like a good time to annoy this chairman or to misread the temperature of the blood inside the Rangers boardroom.

If he is on the wrong end of another heavy beating from King’s nemeses across the city on Saturday it’s certain to be stoney cold.

And that’ll be regardless of what happens at Firhill tomorrow night as Rangers return there for the second time in four days with a place in the semi-finals of the Betfred Cup at stake.

There is a perceived wisdom that any Old Firm manager is only three games away from a crisis. So this run of three straight local derbies has pushed Caixinha’s back up against a wall. If he does not win at least one of them then he’s in trouble.

Should he crash out of one competition and then suffer something even remotely similar to the 5-1 thrashing Celtic inflicted upon him on their last visit it would come as no surprise if he’s loading up his caravan this time next week and looking for his next adventure.

So, yes, this really is the moment of truth and the appropriate time for Caixinha to prove he really was a gamble worth taking when he was plucked from the obscurity of a Qatari desert back in March.

His case has not been helped by the job Derek McInnes continues to do at Pittodrie, despite his side reaching the end of a cycle in the summer. If McInnes was viewed as the obvious option at the time of Caixinha’s arrival then the credentials of the Aberdeen manager to be his replacement have only been wrapped in an iron cloak during the intervening period.

All of which means Caixinha has to start delivering something of substance.

Something more than gimmicks, empty rhetoric or promises of jam tomorrow.

Rather, what he needs is to secure a safe passage into the last four of the Betfred Cup tomorrow night and then back that up by providing some tangible evidence he is capable of eating into Celtic’s superiority.

A victory over the champions would effectively bombproof the home dugout for the time being.

If he can become the first manager

Caixinha has to start delivering something more than gimmicks

KEITH JACKSON