Warbs: Talent on bench gives me options on pitch
Mark Warburton knows Rangers have come miles in two months just by looking at his bench.
The Ibrox boss couldn’t list seven substitutes in the Scottish Cup Final in May with a squad at its bare bones.
Now he looks over his shoulder on match days and sees quality, even if he feels he needs more in the way of quantity.
He said: “It ’s about getting a balance. Last year, we were pretty consistent in terms of selection.
“At Brentford we used the least amount of players from the 92 clubs.
“You need to look at the intensity of the match and the challenge of the games though.
“Eight players have left and nine have come in. Even if just one more comes in, we have only added two in terms of depth.
“But it’s the quality of the players we have added. I ask David Weir, Jim Stewart and the staff every day, ‘ What’s your team now? Who would you play?’
“It ’s interesting how opinions change as days pass and you see people in training.
“In the back of your mind, you have some ideas but you need to trust all the players.
“The most pleasing thing for me is the bench.
“That might sound bizarre but if you look over your shoulder and you have options, that’s good.
“Against Annan, we had Wes Foderingham, James Tavernier, Danny Wilson, Jason Holt, Harry Forrester, Joey Barton and Kenny Miller. That was our bench.
“If you have a squad of 23 but you think, ‘ I have 14 players’ then what’s the point of the rest? Use the academy boys.
“We had what we had last season and had young boys. This year, we need to trust them all.
“People probably thought we were making a statement at the cup final when we didn’t fill the bench.
“We weren’t. We had no other players because we couldn’t use the loan boys who had come back.
“Now it is a pleasant change – we have options all over the park.
“There are a lot of options for guys in different positions. You need to trust them all, otherwise don’t have them at the club.
“The players are buying into the fact it’s one team – it’s not about individuals.”