A SIZEABLE number of people will have viewed Rangers' procession into the Uefa Cup final with the puzzled fascination of watching a car reverse from one end of a road to the other. Those who disdain the manner in which the Ibrox side have made the rendezvous with Zenit St Petersburg in Manchester on Wednesday week, however, should bear in mind that travelling backwards is no bar to reaching your destination.
In any case, reflecting on Walter Smith's redoubtable team's entire, gruelling European campaign this season – a marathon 18 matches already completed – it is plain to see that the most mystifying aspect of it does not relate to any of their games in
the Uefa Cup, but to the final, climactic outing against Olympique Lyonnais in Group E of the Champions League.
Armed as we now are with the subsequent evidence of their immovable refusal to capitulate, it seems almost unnatural that they should lose 3-0 – and at home – in a match in which a draw would have been sufficient to take them into the last 16 of the premier tournament.
The simplest explanation would be to revert to the old maxim that form is temporary and class permanent, that Rangers, ultimately, lacked the quality to compete successfully at the higher level. But that would not account for their own 3-0 triumph in Lyon two months earlier, or the victory over Stuttgart and the draw with Barcelona that saw them share leadership of the group with the Catalan club at the halfway stage.
It seems, in addition, legitimate to argue that there has been a general decline in European standards, one that is most pronounced in the traditional strongholds of Italy, Spain and Germany. Our neighbours in the south will be too busy celebrating the first all-English Champions League final – between Manchester United and Chelsea – to notice, far less concede, that it is long overdue.
For all the wealth and talent that drives the Premier League, its members have a relatively unimpressive record in the most prestigious tournament of all. If Sir Alex Ferguson's and Avram Grant's teams are worthy finalists, it is at least partly attributable to the mediocrity of others.
When the Barcelona coach, Frank Rijkaard, said after the 1-0 defeat in the semi-final at Old Trafford on Tuesday that "if they hadn't played each other (Arsenal v Liverpool] in the quarter-finals, they could easily have had four English teams in the semi-finals", it was a tacit admission that his own side would probably not have reached the last four had they not drawn two of the weakest opponents, Celtic and Schalke 04, in the previous knockout rounds.
Schalke, the only one of the three German representatives to survive the group phase – runners-up to Chelsea with a hardly spectacular eight points, one ahead of Rosenborg – made the quarter-finals largely through drawing the moderate Porto in the last 16, winning on a penalty shoot-out.
The German champions, Stuttgart, finished bottom of Rangers' group after five defeats and one win, the latter by an untidy 3-2 over Smith's team at home, while Werder Bremen also fell at the group stage.
The Italians who made the knockout phase – Lazio did not – Internazionale, Milan and Roma, were despatched in the last 16 or the quarter-finals by Liverpool, Arsenal and Manchester United without mustering a single goal, home or away, in six games between them.
The premature and misguided praise for Barcelona's "geniuses" after their last-16 whipping of a mediocre Celtic in Glasgow was betrayed by their failure to create a genuine scoring opportunity in two matches against Manchester United.
Of Spain's other emissaries, Real Madrid were pathetic in losing home and away to Roma, Sevilla were dumped by the moderate Fenerbahce, and Valencia finished bottom of the group that included Schalke and Rosenborg, with a miserable five points from six games.
The consequences of the overall deficiency in both European competitions, however, are two irresistibly intriguing finals. Ferguson's perfect record in these events – two Cup Winners' Cup and one Champions League victory from three appearances – will be seriously tested by Grant, the Israeli manager of Chelsea making his debut at this stage of a European tournament.
That the two clubs should also be vying for the Premier League championship – United ahead on goal difference with two matches remaining – adds piquancy to the collision. The title will be settled before the Moscow showdown on 21 May and, if United hold off the challenge from Stamford Bridge, it will be their 17th triumph, one short of Liverpool's record.
It will also mean that one manager, Ferguson, will have been responsible for ten of them, an astonishing achievement and a tribute to his sustained excellence. The notion that, at 66, he might retire in the event of capturing a second European Cup may be overtaken by the thought that he could consider the matter of equalling the all-time record of English league championships to be unfinished business.
A week before Moscow, Smith confronts the man for whom he made way at Rangers in 1998, at the end of his only barren season at Ibrox. Dick Advocaat's Zenit St Petersburg underlined the poverty of German football clubs by beating the best of them, Bayern Munich, 4-0 on Thursday, giving the Russians a 5-1 aggregate victory.
Therein lies two even deeper mysteries than Rangers' defeat by Lyon. The first is how Advocaat's team could be on offer at 11-4 at home to beat opponents with whom they had already drawn 1-1 in Munich. The second is how this distracted punter managed not to take advantage. It must be an age thing.
The full article contains 964 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
