Derek Johnstone is backing Graeme Murty to lead Sevco into next season’s title race.
The caretaker Ibrox boss is only in charge until the end of the season and has watched Celtic, Hibs, St Johnstone and Hamilton win at Ibrox as part of his own development plan as a young coach.
After the natives were whipped into a frenzy of anticipation about what they were going to do to Celtic a 3-2 defeat has briefly restored a measure of reality.
Despite Celtic’s heavy fixture programme Sevco are on a par with Aberdeen and Hibs and as far away from Celtic as those two financially compliant companies.
Fine margins and narrowing the gap are the buzzwords coming out of Ibrox this week with Murty unlikely to face any credible contenders for the job that sunk Ally McCoist, Mark Warburton and Pedro Caixinha.
OLD FIRM RECAP
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Derek Johnstone feels #Rangers missed a huge opportunity to beat #Celtic at Ibrox on Sunday, but remains positive about the future under Graeme Murty https://t.co/W6b5QrMl2h— Sky Sports Scotland (@ScotlandSky) March 12, 2018
Johnstone told Sky Sports: “I think he is still favourite to get the job no matter what happens between now and the end of the season.
“If you said to me that Rangers would be competing with Celtic in the last third of the season and in the semi-final of the Scottish Cup, I think I would have bit your hand off for that.”
When ‘Rangers’ were competing with Celtic seems a bit of a mystery with Sevco nine points behind having played a game more and with eight matches left before the split.
After the split Murty will have to take his side away to Celtic and Aberdeen with one more away day. Sevco are five points ahead of Aberdeen and seven clear of Hibs with both of those teams having a game in hand.
