THIS is a time of year when football clubs move on players whose time is up or who have proved unable to make the grade and begin to draft in replacements who they hope will be able to reinvigorate the first team and deliver success in future.
In the past couple of weeks, Dundee, Dundee United, Livingston, St Johnstone and St Mirren have all declared which squad members will be retained for the 2024/25 campaign and which ones will not be reappearing for pre-season training.
Rangers will be no different. The Ibrox club are poised, for the second season running, to have a mass clear out. The likes of Borna Barisic, Ryan Jack, John Lundstram, Jon McLaughlin and Kemar Roofe, a quintet who are out-of-contract, look set to depart. Many others are certain to follow them.
A major summer rebuild has become as much of an annual tradition down Govan way as the Loving Cup ceremony in the Blue Room in their first home match of the New Year.
However, there has been quite a turnover of senior officials at the Glasgow giants in the past couple of years too. Both Stewart Robertson, their long-serving managing director, and Ross Wilson, their much-maligned sporting director, headed off to pastures new around this time last year.
Those exits came after the pair were targeted by supporters who were angry their heroes had once again failed miserably on the park at home and abroad and were set to finish another term trophyless.
But they still allowed Celtic to retain the cinch Premiership, qualify for the Champions League group stage and lift the Scottish Gas Scottish Cup. So it was better, but not good enough.
There were many brassed-off Bears who welcomed the news on Thursday night that chief executive James Bisgrove had accepted an offer from newly-promoted Saudi Arabian outfit Al Qadsiah after little over a year in his job and would be joining Al-Ettifaq manager Steven Gerrard over in the Middle East.
Bisgrove’s involvement in setting up the ill-fated friendly against Celtic in Australia when he was the commercial director back in 2022 – a match that was quickly aborted following an almighty outcry among fans – has never been forgiven by some.
The club describing those protesting as the “rump” of the support in an official statement around that time did nothing to calm a volatile situation.
But many others who cheer on James Tavernier and his team mates on a Saturday afternoon expressed their disappointment at the loss of an individual who had previously held senior positions in the sponsorship and marketing departments of RBS, Betfair, Emirates and UEFA.
As John Bennett, who has become executive chairman on an interim basis, pointed out when the announcement was made earlier this week, Bisgrove has grown commercial revenues “significantly” during the five years he has been on board. Indeed, he has. Incomings have effectively doubled on his watch.
Fans have taken to social media in the past couple of days to demand that somebody who is steeped in football, not another “suit”, is appointed as his replacement. That is, due to the complex demands of the modern game, not going to happen. There is a reason that Michael Nicholson, who is a qualified lawyer, is in situ over at Parkhead, not Henrik Larsson.
But will Bisgrove leaving and a new head honcho coming in really have any major bearing on how Rangers perform domestically and in Europe in the 2024/25 campaign and beyond?
It will probably be irrelevant. Ultimately, how they do on the field is determined by how they fare off it and they continue to be eclipsed by their city rivals on that front.
Their annual accounts in November showed they had made a profit of just £252,000 and a net loss of £4.2m despite a turnover of £83.8m. But two months before that Celtic revealed they had made a profit of £40.7m before tax in their record-breaking financial figures. As the Americans say, you do the math.
Celtic should bank a few bob from player sales – an important area they have consistently outperformed their age-old adversaries in – once again during the close season and will receive £29m from being in the Champions League before Zadoc the Priest is given an airing.
Rangers could bring in Warren Buffett to take over from James Bisgrove and they would still be a goal down before a ball is kicked next season.
