European success earned McLeish right to stay at Ibrox, says Murray

Published on Friday 9 December 2005 01:35

DAVID Murray last night insisted Alex McLeish's position as manager of Rangers is no longer under threat following the Ibrox club's historic success in progressing beyond the group stage of the Champions League.

Rangers chairman and owner Murray declared his unconditional backing for McLeish after a private meeting with the former Scotland defender yesterday afternoon convinced him he had earned the right to lead the team into the last 16 of Europe's premier club tournament.

Murray's decision to retain McLeish's services confounds many who believed the former Motherwell and Hibs manager had effectively been working a period of notice over the past few weeks, which have seen Rangers run up an all-time club record of ten matches without a victory.

However, Murray says his faith in McLeish is unshaken and that he is ready to back him with transfer funds during the January transfer window to assist in improving domestic form which sees Rangers in fifth place in the SPL, a massive 17 points behind leaders Celtic.

"I think today is the end of it," said Murray, who summoned reporters to his Edinburgh office last night. "Alex McLeish is probably in a safer position than 90 per cent of the other football managers in Britain. I'm not giving him the dreaded seal of approval, what I'm saying is that he remains the manager of Rangers without any deadlines, backstops and with no-one else being offered the job.

"Alex knows exactly who was available to us. I received numerous CVs of managers of high repute, but why should any other manager get to enjoy walking out at the Nou Camp or Anfield next year? Alex deserves it. Why should any other manager get the benefit of Dado Prso, Nacho Novo, Brahim Hemdani, Julien Rodriguez and Olivier Bernard coming back from injury? There is no doubt we will start improving when that happens. If we don't, then we do have a problem.

"I met Alex at my house today and asked him how he felt. He said he was a bit bruised, a bit battered but that he loves being the manager of Rangers. He said his family were feeling quite battered as well, but he loved the job and wanted it badly.

"Today was a crunch meeting. I had to look him in the eyes and he is hurt. I said to him before the game on Tuesday night that, whatever happened, we needed 48 hours to condense it all. We both did a lot of thinking on Wednesday and then met today. I knew when I met him that he was up for it. I looked into the guy's eyes and I thought to myself 'why should anyone else get the benefit of him putting that hard work in?'

"I don't think any manager in the history of Rangers has been under more strain than Alex was on Tuesday night. He was on a hiding to nothing."

Murray admitted that Paul Le Guen, the former Lyon coach currently taking a sabbatical from the game, was one potential candidate he considered over the past few weeks if he had decided a change was necessary but firmly denied making any offer to the Frenchman.

"No-one was offered the job," said Murray. "If it had gone wrong, he [Le Guen] would have been one we would have considered, but there are others we would have considered. I've had unsolicited phone calls and CVs from at least 12 and direct ones from about ten. Alex was amazed when I showed him the list.

"I'm not going to comment on individuals, but it is quite obvious we have looked around in the market to see what is available. I would not have been doing my job if I hadn't done that. I had the decency to discuss with Alex that we had a Plan B if we felt he wasn't the man to lead the club. Plan B is not necessary.

"I believe in Alex. Honesty and integrity are things lacking in a lot of people in life, but that man has so much of it."

Murray said he had no regrets about making his public statement following Rangers' 2-0 CIS Insurance Cup quarter-final defeat by Celtic last month regarding McLeish's position, which added to the intense speculation surrounding the manager. "I made the statement because I felt it had to be made at the time," he said. "I don't regret saying it, because I think it focused the mind."