BBC Sportsound pundit Michael Stewart has offered Rangers a bit of brutal honesty on air this week, reminding everyone why it will be so difficult to catch Celtic any time soon, as reported by The Daily Record.
Neil Lennon’s Hoops are on the verge of an eighth title in a row thanks to goals from Odsonne Edouard and James Forrest at the weekend, sinking Steven Gerrard’s side 2-1 and moving 13 points clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership.
Now far enough ahead to be considered champions-elect, some are wondering whether the Ibrox side will ever be able to close the gap on us.
Stewart can’t see it coming any time soon and there’s a simple reason – finances.
As quoted by The Daily Record, the former Hearts man said:
There’s no magic money tree round Ibrox that they can, all of a sudden, create some money from and give it to Steven Gerrard. The club lost an astronomical sum of money last year, they invested heavily in Gerrard and his squad.
I imagine when the financial year is finished and the accounts eventually come out it would be very interesting to see that extra money that’s been generated from the Europa League, whether it amounts to being able to balance out this extra expenditure.
I’ve experienced it myself at Hearts when Vladimir Romanov was continuing to pump money into the club, there is a finite amount of money, it can’t continue indefinitely.
There’s this blind panic of trying to stop 10-in-a-row, but is the infrastructure in place to enable the club to do that?
There’s absolutely no doubt that Rangers have thrown everything at stopping Celtic winning the league this year. They’ve brought in a high profile manager, signed a massive 20 players, stopped thousands of Hoops fans travelling to Ibrox and brought big names like Jermain Defoe to the club.
It has gotten them nowhere and no closer to Celtic, despite one derby victory to their name this season.
Can they continue investing so heavily in the team?
Are Rangers heading for financial peril again? Have you say below…