Alan Pattullo: 'We had good, proper fights in my day' reveals Gough

Published on Monday 30 November 2009 23:13

ALTHOUGH team-mates Kenny Miller and Madjid Bougherra are reported to have come to blows on the training field last week, Richard Gough has identified a debilitating lack of aggression in the Rangers side as being a crucial factor behind the Ibrox club's current problems.

The former Rangers skipper yesterday advised those such as Miller and Bougherra to begin taking out their aggression on the opposition, since he has seen precious little evidence of this of late. Gough highlighted the comments made by Stuttgart's Alexander Hleb following last week's Champions League victory over Rangers, with the ball-player registering his surprise that he had left the Ibrox pitch without a scratch on his body. It was not, Hleb explained, what he expected from a trip to face a British side.

This, pointed out Gough, would have hurt more in his day than any blow landed by a team-mate during a training ground altercation. He urged someone to pin Hleb's comments up in the Ibrox dressing-room as a way to unite the squad, and help focus the players' attention on a common goal. He also hoped that the flare-up between Miller and Bougherra might prove a turning point for Walter Smith's side.

"Maybe this will bring something out in them," he said. "Rangers did not put a glove on Stuttgart physically. Aberdeen (on Saturday] played well, but you forget they had ten men for 35 minutes after a guy was sent off who should never have been sent off. That'll be a worry for Walter."

Gough's time at Rangers, which spanned two spells, saw him play alongside those recognised for their will to win. It did not make them popular with opposition fans but it saw them win favour with their own supporters.

"I think during my period I was lucky," Gough continued. "We had a core of good characters and a lot of players who were mentally very strong, The Hateleys, McCoists, John Browns, McCalls and Fergusons. They were nasty people in the best possible sense. Rangers are missing that at the moment.

"I saw a great quote after the Stuttgart game when their best player, Hleb, said he had come off without a scratch. I know the game has changed. But when he says 'I thought it was going to be a rough 'n' tumble kind of game', and how surprised he was when he came off without a scratch, there should be an alarm bell going off in the head of all the defenders. In my day our mindset was that if they come into the area, they will get hurt. That was our job. It's too easy now."

Gough has even noted a lack of aggression in the Ibrox crowd. In the past such poor performances as last week's against Stuttgart would have resulted in uproar. Instead, Gough said he sensed an "acceptance" at Ibrox, and the perhaps realistic conclusion that they can expect nothing better at present. "There is a dearth of quality now," he said. "I was at the game at Stuttgart and it even felt like the crowd were not their usual self. They were not getting on the team's back. Instead, there was an acceptance. If this was five or ten years ago, they'd be booed off the park."

The former Rangers skipper dismissed the contretemps between Miller and Bougherra, who had been angered by the former's public criticism of him after he returned home late from international duty with Algeria for a third time last week. Gough recalled the number of flashpoints between team-mates when he was a player at Ibrox, and argued that the only difference now is the likelihood that such episodes will reach the public. The code between players – one which states that what happens inside the club, stays inside the club – seems no longer to apply.

"In my time there were a lot of fights and nothing went out to the press," he said. "There's a difference straight away between then and now. This is a wee flare up, handbags at three paces, and yet it's all over the press. It's different now to what it was ten years ago. We didn't have handbags at three paces, we had some good, proper fights. It comes back to the sanctity of the dressing room. I don't know how this has come out. Perhaps someone told a reporter. That was unheard of in my day."

The publicity about the flashpoint between the players has placed Smith in a tricky position. Gough said it would amount to the manager "cutting off his nose to spite his face" if he continued to exclude Bougherra, particularly with Danny Wilson, his 17 year-old centre half replacement, now due a rest. He noted that Wilson had been bullied out of the game by Aberdeen centre forward Lee Miller during Saturday's 1-0 defeat at Pittodrie. But he praised Wilson for his performances since coming into the side, and acknowledged the comparison made by Smith to Dundee United's David Narey.

"If he's even half the player that Narey was then he will be some player," said Gough, who began his career playing alongside Narey at Dundee United at a time, he might have added, when men were men.