Writing was on the wall for Warburton after Tynecastle

PAUL LE GUEN, John Barnes, Tony Mowbray and Ronny Deila. We can now add Mark Warburton to the litany of football idealists Glasgow has embraced, chewed up and spat out with the merest slither of disdain. The timing of the Rangers manager’s departure at 9pm on a Friday was sudden, but let’s not pretend it was unexpected. Since a horrendous 4-1 defeat to Hearts last week, the Englishman has borne the look of the haunted. His public utterances had become increasingly ridiculous and disingenuous. Riddled with nonsensical ifs, buts and contradictions. It was never a case of if he went. Only a question of when. It hardly required the powers of Nostradamus to see the writing on the wall. The lack of public support from the Rangers board spoke volumes. Delays over a new contract for Kenny Miller. Speculation over the future of his scouting chief Frank McParland which went unchallenged. Little or no communication with chairman Dave King. In recent days, Warburton blamed the ‘random nature’ of football for last weekend’s failure against Ross County. Perhaps one day he will acknowledge there was nothing random about it. Abysmal Rangers performances had become a pattern. Tynecastle had an end-of-days feel to it. It quickly became clear the manager was finished. Warburton and assistant David Weir signed new three-year contracts amidst the balmy glow of promotion last July and no one could have seen the speed of their descent. Poor player recruitment was the greatest downfall. To deny that Joey Barton, Jordan Rossiter and Joe Garner were anything other than a poor use of scarce resources was an insult to intelligence. By the end of it all, the Englishman resorted to defiance. It was all he had left. As performances disintegrated amidst a dogged, cussed refusal to acknowledge the gravity of the situation, there was the merest sense of deja vu. It was all begining to feel eerily reminiscent of Mowbray’s Celtic demise in 2010. Mowbray, like Le Guen, Barnes and Warburton, was an essentially decent man. But by the end talk of his ‘philosophy’ was replaced by nonsense. Ultimately, Rangers and Celtic are no places for footballing romantics. They are hard, bruising, demanding football clubs. It takes the hard-nosed pragmatism of a Walter Smith or a Martin O’Neill to keep a manager’s head above water. Mark Warburton came, saw and drowned.