4 games left to save my job, I won’t gripe if board call time
WITH the finishing bell seemingly set to be rung, Graeme Murty had nothing to lose by coming out swinging. In reality, he only has a puncher’s chance of being Rangers manager next season, though.
Come the end of the campaign, Murty will probably feel like he has been the full 12 rounds with Anthony Joshua. He will be battered and bruised for the experience, but he is determined to keep coming back for more.
At the start of the week, few would have given Murty a shot at being Rangers boss beyond the summer. Now, in the knowledge that Steven Gerrard heads the shortlist of candidates that Mark Allen has compiled, Gers fans have all-but written him off.
Events of recent months will undoubtedly have made the 43-year-old stronger but he is not yet ready to close the first chapter in his managerial career as he enters the final weeks of his contract and, in all probability, his time at Ibrox.
“I said when I first came in that this is a stellar job, one of the best jobs in British football,” Murty said.
“There is going to be speculation that is rife through the media, about this guy wanting it, that guy going to get it.
“Until it is signed, sealed and delivered, it is all just speculation and I can’t afford to waste any energy going into an Old Firm game by worrying about it.
“Listen, if the board or the club are going to appoint someone who is not me then I am big enough and man enough to accept it. That’s the job, that’s football. You
and move on. But, I reiterate, we can do better than we have done. All players can. All the staff can. I can.
“I think, up to this point, I have done a good job. I want to do a better job. I want to be given the opportunity to do a better job.
“If I am, fine. If not, no-one can ever, ever take away what I have experienced in the past seven months. I have had a decade of personal development in the last seven months.
“From dealing with you guys, to dealing with changing rooms, to dealing with staff, to dealing with an eerily quiet stadium, to a slow death in front of 50,000 people at Hampden.
“I have been questioned from every single manner of person but I am still sitting here and talking to you about progressing this football onwards.
“I think I have represented myself and developed myself in a very mature and considered and positive manner.”
The Scottish Cup defeat to Celtic earlier this month was viewed as the final blow from which Murty couldn’t recover but the damage has been sustained over the course of his tenure.
He is likely to be offered the chance to return to his role with the Development Squad but his future, if not at Ibrox, surely now lies in first team management.
The trip to Parkhead tomorrow afternoon looks like being his last as Gers boss. He is now drinking in last chance saloon.
He said: “I think whatever post I take up, I will be a better person for this experience.
“Listen, you are talking about a couple of weeks away. I am never going to be anything other than immensely grateful for this opportunity.
“To stand on the sideline and take the amount of Old Firm games I have taken, actually, has been outstanding. I want it to continue.
“But to get it to continue, you have to go and win the games. I understand that, it’s part of football.
“At the moment, I am purely focusing on Sunday. My future and what I do post these four games is something I will consider then.
“As I said, I can’t afford to expend too much energy looking too far ahead because we have a massive game coming up that we need to get right in many aspects.”