Even Alex Rae was left disgusted by the images of drunken louts booting lumps out of each other and throwing bottles and fireworks into the crowd.
The former Ibrox midfielder is usually one of the chief apologists for the club as he spreads his talent between Radio Clyde, BT Sport and any other willing media outlet. He also co-hosts a podcast with Mark Hateley.
After the scenes during the first weekend of March yesterday’s events were entirely predictable and avoidable.
Spurred on by a media that revels in the O** F*** myth all sorts of lies and conspiracies from 2012 have been put forward as FACT! Rae was up in arms a year ago about the SPFL conspiracy that denied Mr Gerrard last season’s title when his side were trailing by 13 points with nine matches left to play.
Despite the best efforts to deflect away from yesterday’s carnage the comments of the First Minister put the spotlight firmly on Ibrox and the anti-Catholic bile that is in the DNA of thousands upon thousands of their supporters. The others manage to hide it better.
Picking up on his comments to Radio Clyde, The Sun reports Rae saying:
It’s absolutely diabolical. How you get to that point where Rangers fans are fighting with their own fans is beyond me. It took a shine off the celebrations because the images are actually getting flashed across Sky Sports and BBC.
It’s a real shame because we should be lauding the players and the club for a great success and we’re not. We’re talking about this and it will rumble on for days.
We can’t have this type of behaviour. We’ve seen a couple of instances over the course of this season where you’ve seen anti-social behaviour. As last night’s gone on, I’m getting more and more frustrated at what I’m seeing. I’m actually getting embarrassed seeing Rangers fans fighting with each other.
I’m thinking, ‘what is this all about?’ You should be celebrating. You should be happy. You are trying to get in the mindset of people who are anti-social. It’s ridiculous, I can’t understand it.
It has been reported that 28 arrests were made, Police Scotland have CCTV evidence and Social Media accounts to identify hundreds more. It is illegal to drink alcohol in public in Glasgow or to travel there for non-essential reasons. Urinating in public and punching fellow fans isn’t deemed as essential reasons to travel.