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5 years of tough choices laid bare at Hampden

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Since the liquidation of Oldco Rangers in 2012, both sides of the divide had to make some very hard decisions with relation to their respective business plans.

Celtic had a squad at Champions League level that it couldn’t keep without a domestic challenge, Sevco didn’t have a squad and needed to build one from the outset with an aim of getting back to the top.

Celtic insulated the revenue lost from diminished ticket sales with player sales, as we saw a team built by Lennon on the sale of McGeady itself liquidated to the English Premiership.

Across our city The Rangers took a very different approach.

They gave the captaincy to Elbows McCulloch and the managerial position to the man who put them in the mess, Ally McCoist.

Instead of developing youth and working their way up they insisted on winning Cups to remain relevant and spent on stop gap measures.

2012 saw Templeton’s promising career come to an end as he plunged into the abyss to play for a big club. All the rest were unwanted and couldn’t command a fee,

This was a decent window of Bosmans for Salary, he brought in some youth and the best of the rest from around Scotland.

Cammy Bell, Nicky Clarke and Nicky Law were all players who should have been moulded into the team that played yesterday, instead where are any of them?

The Championship killed off the youth and its opportunity to gel, Miller and Boyd turned back the clock and MASH sent reinforcements but alas, Motherwell proved too strong.

This is where they cooked their goose, loan players would offer them nothing the next year, the same could be said for Kenny and Kris.

For 1.185 million pounds Warbo built a decent team, he did that by replacing everything that had been built by McCoist.

This team would beat Celtic in the Scottish Cup and provide the press with a deluded fantasy they saw finally die at Hampden yesterday.

The Rangers then had a Championship squad that needed a few players to come in and take them to the next level, something that would have had them challenging for the title next season.

Yesterday a 60,000 pound player in Josh Windass came onto Hampden park to try and turn the game.

He joined Joe Dodoo and Joe Garner on the pitch, themselves players also worthy of actual money and like them did nothing.

Celtic by contrast have maintained a strict fiscal policy which demands surpluses, but budgets for the unearthing of gems.

We always spend on promising talent like Moussa and Eboue who have come to Paradise this year.

We are sniffing around Onyekuru who again fits our business plan, buy cheap, sell big and win some trophies with them while they are here.

The gulf or gap or whatever the hacks are calling it isn’t one created from wealth, it is created through structure and a mechanical adherence to it.

Until Rangers develop a coherent business plan, there is no point worrying about their recruitment strategies.

We saw more than a classier team take Sevco to the cleaners yesterday, we saw 5 years of planning come to fruition.

Congratulations Mr. Lawwell on a job well done.

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