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Ex-Rangers man Numan urges Smith to go on the attack



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Published Date: 16 July 2008
FORMER Rangers full-back Arthur Numan believes Walter Smith must employ a more attacking ethos next season.
Smith's cautious approach reaped rewards last season as Rangers won both domestic cups and came within one match of adding the Clydesdale Bank Premier League and UEFA Cup to their haul.

However, there were murmurings of discontent in the Ibrox stands throughout much of the season as Rangers relied on a lone striker in many of their games.

While Numan understood the need for caution after two barren seasons, a man schooled on total football is looking for Smith to throw off the shackles to some degree.

The former Holland international said: "Sometimes it is inevitable that you play more defensive, especially in Europe, especially when you play away from home, when it is important you don't give away many chances. But, especially when you play at home, you hope to see your team attack and that they will score some goals.

"It is important to find the balance, because some of the games I have seen were too defensive and it was all about getting a result.

"Hopefully we will see a lot of entertaining games this season."





The full article contains 207 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 16 July 2008 10:20 AM
  • Source: Edinburgh Evening News
  • Location: Edinburgh
  • Related Topics: Rangers FC
 
1

Daillyman,

16/07/2008 14:46:12
We are all hoping for more entertainment Arthur.
2

chazbud,

16/07/2008 15:55:33
surely it cant get any worse.yes we want attacking players and flair players,but our club have NO ambition.EG not paying 500k more for Davis, not agreeing wage demands with a championship player-Danny Sh*ttu, being linked with more championship players-Loovens, signing Velicka and Miller, Being Duped by Liewell and Chesney for Lafferty, stadium is too small has been for years, Weir new contract, signing Dailly, desperate signature of Cousin etc etc..is it worth £400 season ticket money to come second AGAIN? Its almost embarrassing.
3

stefano,

Brum 16/07/2008 16:20:47
Chazbud, geez peace. We paid £2m for kevin Thomson and Steve Davis is on a par - no reason to pay twice that for a player who isn't twice as good.

Ditto paying £20k in wages for a Championship playing 27 year old. His loss, not ours.

Lafferty has huge potential, Velicka is a great signing and let's wait until the window closes rather than commit hari-kiri in July.
4

chazbud,

16/07/2008 20:41:29
i personally wouldnt sign davis or shittu, but its the fact we CANT negotiate, why dont we have other targets,why are we are linked with NO-ONE, again today, LOOVENS, a guy from Cardiff, is that our standard?, is that where we are aiming? All that money made last year, selling our best player to replace him with Broadfoot a FREE from ST MIRREN and bringing in DAILLY who DIDNT get a game at Southampton or West Ham...is that Rangers? Im sick and hari-kiri or whatever you call it, its not, im being TOTALLY honest, take your blue specs off and ask your self, is it worth 30-40 pounds a ticket to watch that? no thank you, im expecting us to spend at least 8m on 2 class acts (4 each) probably a Centre Half and a Midfielder who can pass and run and hit a freekick(we have NO set piece specialists-Celtic have over 6! FACT-Matchwinners/Goals), we have no one who can do that just now.And your support of Thommo is baffling, he has taken so long to settle at Rangers, he thought he was Franz Beckenbauer in Manchester for Uefa Final..too greedy not strong enough...he has the lot to prove.If it was upto me Barry would be away and the team would be built around Boyd, Cuellar and Mcgregor.Maybe Le Guen was right about him??!!?? Lafferty should be a legend in the making for 3m at 20! and Velicka will be good. And whats wrong with 27 Stefano? Our average first 11 age is over 30....Weir, Dailly, Fergie, Mcculloch, Hemdani, Velicka, Miller, Cousin, Darcheville ALL on about 20k a week....any more?
5

BEMUSED EXILE,

16/07/2008 21:21:14
chazbud

Your frustration is obvious, but I'm afraid that the reality is pretty much exactly the way that you hope that it isn't!

RFC were officially around £16 million in debt this time last year, BEFORE Walter went on his £10 million spending spree. We've already spent around £6.5 million on Lafferty, Miller and Velicka, which will increase to about £10 million if we sign Davis. The rumour is that we may swap Cousin for Loovens (a decent player anf former Dutch Under-21 internationalist, BTW), so no money will be coming in for players sold.

That adds up to £20 million on players over 2 summers. There's no way that the money for Hutton added to the CL/UEFA money will come to more than £20 million after deductions, so that is effectively already spent, and SDM is not keen to further increase the debt.

Welcome to the 21st Century order!
6

,

16/07/2008 21:28:09
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7

,

16/07/2008 21:36:58
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BEMUSED EXILE,

16/07/2008 21:48:46
I've been repeating the same mantra in recent days Tim. Another very close title race, but Celtic deserve to start as favourites. I said throughout last season that it would go to the wire, and although I changed my mind a couple of times regarding which side would prevail, I was fundamentally accurate in my judgement.

As for "luck", RFC certainly carried plenty of it in all cup competitions last season, but I don't think that it smiled any more on them than it did on Celtic over the 38 SPL matches.

Rangers narrowly missed out on the title because, quite simply, they were slightly inferior to Celtic. Nothing more and nothing less. Celtic are making a couple of moves in the transfer market now, while Rangers have already made a few. Your disdain for Miller, Velicka and Lafferty are well documented, but FFS, they have to be a step forward from the unfit Darchville, the disinterested Cousin, and the useless Sebo, so I'm confident that we'll be sharper up front this time around.

We'll all have a better idea when we compare the final squads when the proper action begins, but for me, another tight race beckons.
9

,

16/07/2008 21:59:20
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10

BEMUSED EXILE,

16/07/2008 22:08:48
Tim

I think the problem is that we both tend to remember any lucky breaks that the opposition get, and curse them for it, while at the same time convince ourselves that our own team deserves every good thing that comes to it.

In the SPL, I tend to remember the extremely fortuitous OG that gave you a home win against Killie; the offside goal that beat Falkirk; the soft (to put it mildly) free kick that saw off St Mirren; and most of all, understandably, the two poor decisions in the last OF game that saw an offside goal stand and a penalty given for an offence outside of the penalty area.

Indeed, if the officials had got those 2 OF decisions correct, the title would have gone to Ibrox. That's how close the whole season was!

I'm not complaining about any of that though, because I don't think that Celtic had significantly more luck than Rangers in reality. I reckon that it probably just about evened out, and as I said in my previous post, Celtic ended up winning because they were just that tiny bit better.

But I haven't seen anything happen yet to make me believe that the gap has in any way widened, which is why I predict another tight race.
11

,

16/07/2008 22:19:32
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,

16/07/2008 22:22:10
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BEMUSED EXILE,

16/07/2008 22:26:51
Tim

Every night could be my last night of unbroken sleep for a very long time, so you don't need to convince me!

 

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