The announcement should be about Steven Gerrard and it should be a way of saying to Rangers fans, we’re getting our act together.
Steven Gerrard has been confirmed as new Rangers manager. A deal has been agreed which will see the Liverpool legend take over at Ibrox on a four-year contract.
After multiple meetings, Gerrard put pen to paper on a deal on Thursday night, when he met Rangers managing director Stewart Robertson and director of football Mark Allen.
The Scottish Premiership side confirmed the news on Twitter on Friday afternoon. They could not just announce his arrival straight out. No, they had to drag it out for a while with teaser tweets before they dropped the news.
— Rangers Football Club (@RangersFC) May 4, 2018
#RangersFC are delighted to confirm that Steven Gerrard has agreed to become the new manager of the Club. pic.twitter.com/uUOVnJWI7I
— Rangers Football Club (@RangersFC) May 4, 2018
Gerrard has done well in his role as Liverpool’s U18s boss this season and was quickly identified as a top target by the Gers board to take over from the recently sacked Graeme Murty. Indeed, Gerrard was reportedly being lined up even before Murty was cut adrift.
The Rangers release announcing Gerrard as the new boss was all pomp and ceremony, with an insistence on referring to themselves as ‘the Club’.
“I am honoured to become the next manager of Rangers,” Gerrard said. “I have enormous respect for this football club, and its history and tradition.
“I can’t wait to start this new journey at Rangers as we look to build on the many successes that this Club has achieved.”
That’s all well and good but the majority of the release was taken up by board level employees all lining up to say the exact same thing. Step forward chairman Dave King, managing director Robertson AND director of football Allen.
The release should be about Gerrard and it should be about the Rangers supporters. Instead, after the most canned of quotes from the incumbent manager, the suits take over and all drone on about success, desire, excitement and ‘the Club’. All looking to justify their high-paid positions and show everyone they are hard at work.
It’s exactly the sort of corporate and PR drivel that has infected so much of modern sport. Gerrard, we’re sure, will get an opportunity to speak directly to the fans – probably in a stage-managed Rangers TV set-up – and one hopes he makes a connection that way. A club of great success and tradition in past years, their supporters have been hurting for the guts of a decade. Give them something to cling to and hope for over the summer.
Gerrard exclusively told SportsJOE at the end of March:
“I feel like I’m a man on the move. I don’t want to stand still for very long. I want to progress, I want to improve, I want to keep testing myself.
“There’s no timescale on this, but I certainly want to coach at the top. Whether that happens in one, two, three, four years is hard to predict, but it’s definitely in my thinking.
“I’m really hungry and I’m going to make sure I continue to move forward in the right way.”
* Additional reporting by Darragh Murphy
