Be careful what you wish for, Gordon Strachan tells anti-Rangers fans

As A former Celtic manager, Gordon Strachan took an obvious pleasure in seeing Rangers beaten. Just not beaten into the ground. Strachan yesterday issued a warning to the rest of Scottish football that killing off the Ibrox club would amount to an act of self-harm.

Strachan accepts that Rangers must be punished for their financial wrongdoing, but has cautioned the remaining Premier League teams against putting themselves in danger with an over-reaction.

He senses there may be a few clubs, victims of many reverses to Rangers over the years, keen to settle scores, but Strachan asserts the right result for the Scottish game is that any sanctions still give Ally McCoist’s team scope to come again as Celtic‘s strongest rival.

“A top division without Rangers can’t happen,” said Strachan. “If there’s been misdemeanours at a club you have to suffer the consequences, but you don’t kill somebody off.

“You don’t kill off everybody’s dreams and hopes, be they supporters, coaches or players. You have to have a punishment the club can survive.

“Rangers can, later on, get back to where they should be. Standing shoulder to shoulder with Celtic and having that great derby game that everybody likes. I just can’t get my head around there being no Rangers and Celtic game.

“As for the Third Division, could East Stirling handle the crowds for a Rangers game? There needs to be punishment, but there has to be common sense at the same time.

“A ten-point penalty would at least keep them there and it could be overcome. If you’re an Old Firm manager ten points in front and they claw five points back then the panic’s on, trust me.”

Strachan reckons supporters of other clubs apparently savouring Rangers’ potential demise might just be indulging in spot of bluffing.

He said: “Would Celtic fans really like to win the league without Rangers being there? Would they enjoy it? I don’t think they would. It would seriously deplete the SPL’s bargaining powers with television stations not to have the Old Firm.

“Ask the fans of the other clubs if they’d like to be without Celtic and Rangers as well. They want them there. They enjoy it and the thought of beating these guys. Trust me, I’ve been on the end of such defeats. The fans won’t stay away if Rangers aren’t punished. They all talk heartily, but I don’t think so.”

Based in the Midlands, Strachan watches Scottish football from afar these days and has retained a frustration, first expressed when he was in charge at Celtic, that television undersells the Old Firm product by primarily broadcasting only their away fixtures.

He added: “The Old Firm game is the one match that everyone around the world says: ‘I need to watch that game.’ It’s the one game in Scotland that fills the screen with colour and noise. There are games in Scotland which don’t fill the screen.

“Without taking any money away from the smaller clubs, they should show more games live from Ibrox and Parkhead. Sometimes people only see them away from home. You don’t show Manchester United only away from home all the time.”

Strachan, a Lloyds TSB Scotland Schools’ Football Ambassador, confides he misses Celtic, but claims not be unfulfilled since departing his last management job at Middlesbrough in October 2010.

He said: “At the Old Firm your heartbeat fluctuates. At the moment I’m flatlining, which is actually very nice, but to keep alive you have to go up and down now and then. Loads of aspects I miss.

“Saying that, there’s not a day I’ve been bored. I’ve seen managers on the touchline and thought: ‘Thank goodness I’m not doing that anymore.’ I’ve been asked to do a couple of things, but they haven’t been for me.

“I have sympathy for anyone that’s an Old Firm manager because one’s always in trouble. Some things in management you never get taught. I feel for Ally [McCoist], but it will make him stronger. His sense of humour has kept him going.”

Strachan’s duties extended beyond the media yesterday and into coaching sessions at both schools involved in the Lloyds TSB Scotland Under-18s Senior Shield final next Tuesday between Calderglen High in East Kilbride and St Mungo’s High in Falkirk.

“I’ve told them it’s an experience to enjoy, not to fear,” he added. “I loved school football. I played for hours and hours. I think academy football can be a bit clinical at times in terms of earning contracts. School football is having a laugh with your friends. There’s room for both.”

When one Calderglen High pupil joked that meeting Strachan had been better than expected it got a smile in return. “That’s a good answer, by the way,” laughed Strachan. Now for Scottish football to find the right response when it comes to Rangers.