Gerrard must hit the ground running or he will suffocate, warns McCoist
FROM Alan Shearer to Alan Brazil, a list of ex-footballers as long as the telephone directory have lined up to give Steven Gerrard advice on how he should manage Rangers. Of all the pundits, perhaps only Brazil’s Talksport radio sidekick Ally McCoist possesses the insight to make a proper call on what will face the former Liverpool and England captain.
McCoist managed Rangers for three-and-a-half-years and learned first-hand about the intense pressure that immediately descends upon the shoulders of the man chosen to take on one of the most unforgiving roles in football.
A former captain of Liverpool and England and one of the finest players of his generation, Gerrard’s name carries respect and bought him plenty of instant goodwill when he accepted his first job in management.
But McCoist scoffs at many of the views being spouted by some of the media’s big hitters south of the border.
‘Stevie Gerrard is a good and an interesting appointment,’ says McCoist. ‘But he’s not going to get a lot of breathing space. He will need to hit the ground running.
‘When he got the job a few of the English lads phoned me and asked if he would get a free hit at it for a season. I was like: “Are you having a laugh?” No chance!’
McCoist’s message can be boiled down to three devastatingly simple words. Sign better players.
That might be a statement of the blindingly obvious, but McCoist argues that it simply will not matter how good Gerrard proves to be as a man manager or tactician if the team at his disposal is not furnished with the personnel to make a fist of a title challenge to Celtic.
Under Gerrard’s old Anfield boss Brendan Rodgers, Celtic have mined new levels of consistency en route to consecutive Trebles. The gap between the clubs has scarcely been wider and McCoist insists the Rangers board must back their manager accordingly.
‘The appointment is a gamble but I’ve said all along that more important than the appointment itself is how much support the manager is going to get,’ said McCoist.
‘He will need an opportunity to bring a better quality of player into Rangers. That’s the most important thing.
‘I wish Stevie Gerrard well but he will need the support to do that if they wish to challenge Celtic.
‘I’d be very surprised if he didn’t look for one or two assurances before he came.’
Gerrard’s first game will come in the Europa League qualifiers next month. The club’s third-place finish last season ensured they will start at the first preliminary round and McCoist argues that the final league table merely offered a reflection of the standard of player at Ibrox.
‘Rangers are where they are just now because that’s where the squad should be,’ acknowledges McCoist.
‘I think people sometimes focus too much on wages and budgets and all that stuff. You just need to step back and take a look at the quality of player.
‘Look at that squad and you think second, third. I’m not surprised at that. That’s where Rangers are just now.
‘To eventually challenge Celtic at the top of the league and win cups they will need better. Don’t get me wrong, they have some good players. They don’t need 11 new players.’
Already, Rangers have moved to make Jamie Murphy’s loan move from Brighton permanent and have been in further negotiations with the south-coast club to sign defender Connor Goldson. Midfielder Ovie Ejaria has been brought in from Liverpool on a season-long loan, while Scott Arfield has been secured from Burnley.
McCoist was particularly pleased to see Allan McGregor return to Glasgow. The goalkeeper left Ibrox for Besiktas after the club’s financial meltdown in 2012.
Although McGregor opted to exercise his right to move rather than transfer his contract to Charles Green’s Newco and play for McCoist’s team in the old SFL Third Division, McCoist believes the 36-year-old is still held in high esteem by the club’s supporters.
‘I think he will be welcomed back by the vast majority of Rangers fans,’ said McCoist.
‘He was at Ibrox during better times and I would imagine his ego will be such that he will want to get them back there and experience that again.
‘Goalkeepers are unique in the position they play where they can go on a lot longer. He’ll not come up here with the mindset that he’ll be sitting on the bench.
‘He will want to play and he is a player who clearly knows what the club is all about.’
If it was McCoist’s misfortune to land ‘the dream job at the nightmare time’ when he was appointed in 2011, he points out that he was time-served as an assistant to Walter Smith with first Scotland and Rangers before being thrust into the frontline.
Gerrard has had a year in charge of the Under-18 side at Liverpool and McCoist believes the input of his assistant and former Anfield team-mate Gary McAllister will be vital.
‘I don’t think I would compare the two situations,’ he says. ‘I would be keen to remind everyone I had a couple of years with Walter assisting the national team and then four-and-a-half assisting at Rangers, so I had a fair idea what I was getting into.
‘It’s vitally important Steven gets good people round about him. I know Gary Mac very well and he is a great lad. I speak to him regularly but lately I’ve been away so I’ve not had a chance to speak to him in depth.
‘I will do that. He has done the right thing bringing in his own staff, because he will 100 per cent need people he can trust.
‘I was very fortunate that I had that in my staff and he will have that in Gary Mac. The added bonus for Stevie will hopefully be that there are others around the club that he can trust too.’