He’d probably give you his right hand for a win over Celtic today but Chris Sutton believes that a home win at Ibrox today would be a disaster for Pedro Caixinha.
Twelve months ago Mark Warburton was being proclaimed as the eighth wonder of the world after his side scraped a Scottish Cup win over Celtic on penalties.
One London based pundit claimed that Warbo was a future England manager and no one dared to challenge that view. Dave King was talked into writing a new three year contract on the back of that semi-final success.
Warbo is now fighting a relegation battle with Nottingham Forest with the fifth best coach in Qatar trying to get blood out of a stone from a collection of players well out of their Championship comfort zone.
Over 90 minutes almost anything can happen with Sutton long enough in the tooth to realise that Celtic could have an off day at Ibrox leading to an outbreak of off the radar joy that will be crafted to last throughout the summer season ticket sales period.
“Caixinha will want to win and he was passionate in demanding more at his press conference on Thursday,” Sutton explains in the Daily Record. “Good for him but the Rangers boss talking up his players again and saying they are the best around is misplaced realism and that stuff spreads, meaning it might do him more harm in the long term than good.
“We saw the way Dave King reacted to last season’s Scottish Cup semi-final win over Celtic. He thought it made his club title challengers and what a massive overreaction that proved to be.
“Expectations got stupidly unrealistic. And that was from inside the boardroom.
“If Rangers win today, Caixinha might find himself included in the same storyline because the Rangers chief has hardly done much to encourage enthusiasm over the past few months, has he?”
Sutton added: “Let’s deal with facts here. While people were getting upset about Caixinha smiling with Rodgers last week, and then moving glasses around a table at the press conference to explain the defeat, the big picture was being missed.
“He’s not to blame for this situation. He’s come here, he’s working hard by all accounts and the fault lie elsewhere – particularly in the boardroom and the dressing room.
“I have two major questions. The first one is are the Rangers players overpaid or are they simply under-performing?
“Personally, I think it’s the former. The way they performed last weekend against Celtic is as good as they are.
“They are not worth what they are getting. As far as I’m concerned, some of them are not real Rangers players, they are just happy to be playing for the club.
“What can Caixinha do with that lot? Rodgers would struggle to get a tune out them. So would Jose Mourinho or Pep Guardiola for that matter. They just aren’t good enough.
That means they’ll need replacing, which brings us to King and the second question.
“Where on earth is the director of football?
“How can it take three months to find one? Have they just forgotten about one?
Caixinha is going to need some help from on high in the summer because the squad needs seriously shaken up.
“King spoke of big spending to get into his post in the first place, yet we’ve not really seen it and he’s going to need to dig deep to improve this Ibrox side because they are miles off.
“The fans can see the issues. Beating Celtic today would, like last season, give King an excuse to smile and think everything’s alright. He would be digging the “Going for 55” banners out again.
“Caixinha insisted this week that his “board and my management are the best in the world”. We’ll soon find out.”
