Beale raises the white flag as he pleads for patience

Back in November Micky Beale was talking up the Europa League finalists and making promises about delivering the 56 whatever that might be.

With the training ground genius in charge and the January transfer window around the corner suddenly life was looking good for the bears who had watched their side become the worst ever in the history of the Champions League.

There wasn’t much broken, more than half of the season remained with Beale able to apply the skills that had been kept in the background under Steven Gerrard.

After his first defeat as Ibrox boss Beale has changed his tune, raising the white flag and digging for excuses ahead of the inevitable conclusion to this season.

A summer revamp is apparently being planned but the new boss at Ibrox is already working to downplay expectations.

Football Scotland reports Beale saying:

In general, if you look at any league in the world, the team that spends the most is first. So we have to compete against the odds because we’re not going to spend the most money. We’re not going to recruit the finished product. So there’s a lot of coaching, a little bit of patience and a lot of good work to go on.

It is going to be a significant summer. There are no quick fixes so the word ‘patience’ comes out again, the word that nobody in this city likes. But the reality is that over 90 days we’ve made steady progress, regardless if people say that we haven’t. I’m saying we have and that’s my opinion. Everyone is entitled to their own.

Last summer Ross Wilson spent £12m on Rabbi Matondo, Ridvan Yilmaz and Ben Davies, on Sunday Celtic’s midfield cost £1.5m with the same sun spent on substitute Matt O’Riley.

Ange Postecoglou’s rebuild has been funded through the sales of players, if Beale is dependent on player sales this summer there is unlikely to be much to excite the fans ahead of next season.