Rangers fans in Northern Ireland accept 'inevitability' of van Bronckhorst sacking

Although the former Dutch international took the Glasgow giants all the way to last year’s Europa League final, the club has already lost too much ground to Old Firm rivals Celtic to have a realistic change of winning the one trophy that really counts – the Scottish Premier League.

Rangers in second place are currently nine points behind Celtic after just 15 games.

Brian Weir of the Rathfriland Rangers Supporters Club said it was definitely time for van Bronckhorst to move on.

"I think it was inevitable to be honest because of the run of results,” he said.

"There are a few things going wrong, including a lot of injuries which hasn’t helped, but his bread and butter is the domestic league and the form in the domestic league just isn’t good enough.

"I cannot see any structure to the way he plays domestically. He lost the fans a while back.

"I think Gio should be getting more out of the players than he is currently, but a lot of that is down to the style of football that he plays, which is dire.”

Mr Weir said he believes the club’s decision will be widely welcomed, based on the conversations he has had with fans from both Northern Ireland and Scotland.

"From the boat journeys across, and from talking to different fans, the fan base by and large had lost faith in Gio to pull himself out of it,” he said.

Mr Weir also said that the club’s most recent signings, who would not necessarily have been selected by van Bronckhorst, are not good enough to move Rangers forward.

"I think we have signed players who are not fit for the first team,” he said.

"At the start of the season, not one of our summer signings were making the first team.

"There is something seriously wrong there, whenever they are not fit to make the first team from the get go.

"It’s not squad players we need – it’s to improve the first team.”

Van Bronckhorst, 47, replaced Steven Gerrard as Rangers manager on November 18, 2021 and led the club to that European final in Seville – losing on penalties – within his first six months in charge.

However, just days later they won the Scottish Cup for the first time in 13 years with a 2-0 extra-time victory over Hearts at Hampden Park.

Despite the cup success, many fans remained unconvinced by van Bronckhorst as Rangers finished the domestic season four points behind Celtic – with two derby defeats in February and April proving particularly damaging.

Former manager Steven Gerrard – who left to take over at Aston Villa just over a year ago but was axed last month – is among the favourites to replace van Bronckhorst.

Another front runner is Michael Beale who was an assistant to previous manager Gerrard and is reputed to have brought the majority of the coaching expertise to Gerrard’s set-up.