I’m happy to play waiting game
Murty insists neither he nor players need swift decision over his future
GRAEME MURTY insists he has no problem waiting until the end of the season for a decision to be made on his future.
Former Rangers defender Frank de Boer is the latest name to be linked with the manager’s post amid mounting speculation an announcement could be made sooner rather than later.
Contracted only until the summer, interim boss Murty takes his side to Motherwell at lunchtime today looking to avert a third straight defeat.
Successive reverses to Celtic and Kilmarnock led to Alex Rae claiming the Ibrox board were now obliged to look at Steve Clarke as a possible managerial replacement, with Ally McCoist this week insisting clarity on the issue in the near future was essential.
Were the matter to remain unresolved until the end of the campaign, though, Murty fails to see why that should impact negatively on his players.
‘What uncertainty do they have?’ he asked. ‘They have known all the way through they have got me until the end of the season.
‘Everyone knows they are being assessed every day they come in here by myself, the director of football, the staff — and when they walk on the pitch by you guys and the fans.
‘So they need to showcase themselves in a good light. The only way any of us have a future at Rangers is by being successful.’
Asked if he would consider going to chairman Dave King to establish where he presently stands, Murty was adamant: ‘No. I am focusing on doing a really good job, on making sure my job is done to the best of my ability.
‘If someone then decides they are going to go in a different way, I will respect that. But I will do everything until that time to execute the roles within this job as best as I possibly can.’
Lauded ahead of a seasondefining showdown with Celtic three weeks ago, Murty was cast in another role by the time Killie inflicted a seventh home defeat of the season on the Ibrox club seven days later. That of a feather duster.
‘We have to get away from this “one-game” mentality,’ he said yesterday. ‘Where we do really well in one game and I’m the best thing since sliced bread and the team is the best thing since sliced bread, and we lose one game and it’s all doom and gloom.
‘We have to look at where we have come from and where we want to get to. This team is a work in progress. We are moving to where we want to be, we are not there yet but we are moving in the right direction.’
Murty’s logic ought to be impossible to argue with. Inheriting a shambles from Pedro Caixinha last October, he commendably moulded Rangers into an outfit capable of winning nine games from ten prior to coming unstuck.
Having taken the club some distance along the path it desired, there was hope he could take it a little further. As it transpired, however, Celtic and Killie proved impassable road blocks.
The trouble for Murty wasn’t so much the loss of an unlikely league title but a change in perception. The man who was undefeated to Brendan Rodgers in two matches became the man who couldn’t beat him in three. Right now the appetite to prevent Celtic disappearing from view is ravenous.
‘Rightly so,’ said Murty. ‘That is the nature of the club. The way we are judged and the standard we are held to is different.
‘You know that walking in the door. You know that as an academy player, as an academy coach and you definitely know that as a first-team player.
‘I said when Celtic were drawn out of the hat (in the Scottish Cup semi-final) that people come here to play massive games and be judged in the big games. It is a conscious choice.
‘So deal with the pressure and do everything you can to get a positive result for yourself and your team. That is all I have asked the players to do.’
What McCoist and Rae don’t know about the expectations at the club isn’t worth knowing. So when both felt moved to comment on the need to end the managerial uncertainty in short order, few of a Light Blue persuasion feel inclined to take issue. This was always going to be the soundtrack to the final three months of Murty’s present arrangement.
He added: ‘I can’t control the messages from outwith the group. If I spent time considering what he said and what they said, I’d never get on with the job.
‘We had a reversal — in a game where we were a little bit flat after a really pulsating Old Firm game.
‘That’s one game where we haven’t been at the right intensity. Previous to that, we had ten games in 40 days and won nine of them, so we were in a really good place. We won’t throw out all that hard work because of one bad result.’
Others will follow De Boer’s name in being linked with the job. For Murty, however, an uncertain future won’t prevent him from preparing for it.
He said: ‘Preparation for pre-season, for recruitment, for Europe should we get there at this round or that round, has already started. Things are being put in place regardless of who is in this seat.’
If his own long-term aspirations are be realised, Motherwell today would be an opportune time and place for the fightback to begin.
‘We have targeted second, targeted improvement and targeted challenging for the cup,’ added Murty. ‘Are we still capable of those things? We are.’
Graham Dorrans and Ross McCrorie could return from injury at Fir Park but a setback for Lee Wallace means he won’t yet be involved.