Billy Davies tells Rangers fans: Cut Ally McCoist some slack

BILLY Davies would have been forgiven for thinking he had travelled back 30 years in time when he took his seat at Ibrox on Sunday.

Back in Glasgow on television punditry duty, Davies took his seat among just over 17,000 others to watch Rangers’ troubled campaign take another turn for the worse with their 2-0 Scottish Cup exit at home to Dundee United. The size of the attendance, affected by the tie not being included on season tickets and the early kick-off time for live terrestrial television coverage, combined with the paucity of Rangers’ performance to provoke comparisons with the grim era of the early 1980s for the club.

It was during that period that Davies made his first-team breakthrough for Rangers, with rows of empty seats at Ibrox the rule rather than an exception. There were only 5,000 at his home debut in a League Cup tie against Brechin City in 1981, for example, while just 13,000 witnessed his first Premier Division appearance at Ibrox against Partick Thistle the same year.

The circumstances which currently threaten to send Rangers back into another bleak spell of their history are rather different, of course, but the identity of one of the main figures involved is the same.

Ally McCoist joined the club as a player in 1983, sharing with Davies more of the soulless occasions at Ibrox which preceded the dramatic revolution of the Graeme Souness era.

As McCoist’s first season as manager threatens to implode, Davies believes it is time for those among the club’s support criticising him to appreciate mitigating factors.

“Give Ally a break,” said Davies. “He is working under very difficult circumstances. He is doing the best he can and trying to deal with circumstances out of his control. I shake my head at times at the criticism towards him. He should be given a break because he is trying to do the best job he can along with Kenny McDowall and Ian Durrant.

“At every football club, you have a board of directors and their role is finance. They’ve got to take care of the club and be prudent about how it moves forward. You’ve then got the middle men, who do the negotiation of deals and sort out the signings. Then you’ve got the manager and staff, who quite simply can only work with the resources provided. That’s why I say, give him a break.

“Being a manager is pressure, at every single level and every single division. You know that when you step into the manager’s role but the circumstances at Ibrox are very difficult to work under and that’s why I feel they are doing the best they can. They have a great staff there, a very experienced staff, but at the end of the day the board and the middle men have a responsibility to provide resources.”

Davies, who was never slow to vent his frustration at what he saw as a lack of boardroom support during his spells as manager of Derby County and Nottingham Forest, has empathy with what McCoist has just experienced in the January transfer window with the loss of leading scorer Nikica Jelavic. “I can relate it to myself at Forest in January two years ago,” he said. “We were sitting second in the Championship and had gone 20 matches undefeated. We’d just beaten West Brom in a live Sky game at their place and I lost our left back, Nicky Shorey, which was very disappointing. I watched Newcastle sign six players that month, West Brom sign five and us not sign any. What can you do?

“You know yourself that you have one foot in the Premier League, but the board is there to deal with the long-term finances and they know what it is best for the club. As a manager, you are disappointed. If your remit is to get to the Premier League and the manager and staff do the job of getting into that position in the middle of January with only 18 or 19 games remaining, that’s the time you are looking for board support.

“But what is the financial position [at Rangers]? It’s difficult for me to talk about that but, from a manager’s point of view, they are working under very difficult circumstances and it must be affecting one or two people in terms of focus. There is no doubt there are troubled times ahead, they’ve said that publicly. But you can only look at the manager and what he is trying to do with that. Throw in some injuries and it is very difficult.”