Footballing "what ifs?"

Boxers famously refrain from sex before a fight to improve performance. What if Alan McGregor didn't pump ten burds a night? How good would he be?
 
If the consortium of Brian Kennedy, Souness etc gained control of the club rather than Charles Green and his band of thieves

I'm not saying everything would have been rosy and it would have been like admin never happened. But it's something I've always wondered about how we would have looked then and now.
 
If hateley hadnt been sent off against brugge.

We missed his experience in france and he could have got us the win we needed.

Also, if roxburgh had shown the leadership and did what fergie had done and dropped leighton who had been shite in 89/90 season and brought in goram instead.

That group at italy 90 was our best chance to progress into the knock out stages ever imo even more so than 78.
 
Charlie Miller never drunk and snorted away all his talent. Many people especially former players go on about how well they get on with him, who he was a good guy etc.

Bull the guy was a total idiot who totally blew a natural gift.

I see Charlie and I just think what a loser man, imagine having that opportunity and totally wasting it
 
What if Robert Sarver had managed to buy the club before our current board managed to wrestle it back from the spice.

What if R9 Ronaldo didn't have that mystery fit before the world cup final 98
 
Season 65/66 drew2 lost 2 in march,lost league to filth by 2pts and lost both cup finals to the filth
Baxter leg break v Rapid
Berwick
 
Wordy_Rappinghood said:
It would be very interesting to see what the three in a row mainstays would have achieved had the Whyte debacle not happened.
Alan McGregor would be up there with the most exalted names in our history, that's for sure. If we'd been stable that season we may well have won the league even with Ally in charge. Celtic were no great shakes and we had better players.
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Genuinely thought we were on our way to 4 and potentially 5 in a row with that squad.

A stuttering start but we were in decent enough form until mid November of that year. Let's not forget that Lennon was 45 minutes away from the sack as they were 3 down at Killie. They came back to draw (even then they very nearly lost it at the death IIRC) and we ended up ridiculously drawing later that day with St Mirren. They got a boost from all that and at that stage there was possibly whispers of administration having an impact in our camp.
 
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superallythe2nd said:
Genuinely thought we were on our way to 4 and potentially 5 in a row with that squad.

A stuttering start but we were in decent enough form until mid November of that year. Let's not forget that Lennon was 45 minutes away from the sack as they were 3 down at Killie. They came back obviously came back and we ended up ridiculously drawing later that day with St Mirren. They got a boost from all that and at that stage there was possibly whispers of administration having an impact in our camp.
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Was about to board a flight to Tenerife that afternoon and my mate sent me a message saying ‘Bye Bye Neil’. I checked my phone and they were three nil down and we had a healthy lead at the top. I had a relaxed near five hour flight to the Canary Islands, safe in the knowledge that they had been pumped and we would take care of St Mirren at home. What a shock I got when I charged my phone at the hotel. That weekend, along with Naismith’s injury was undoubtedly two turning points in that season. Regardless of what was going on behind the scenes I feel if Celtic lost and we won that day, and if Naismith was fit, we would have kept the momentum going to blow them away.
 
superallythe2nd said:
Genuinely thought we were on our way to 4 and potentially 5 in a row with that squad.

A stuttering start but we were in decent enough form until mid November of that year. Let's not forget that Lennon was 45 minutes away from the sack as they were 3 down at Killie. They came back obviously came back and we ended up ridiculously drawing later that day with St Mirren. They got a boost from all that and at that stage there was possibly whispers of administration having an impact in our camp.
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I thought exactly the same mate

We won the league at rugby park and had started our admin season flying! Then we just hit a wall but I think the players and mccoist knew all wasn’t well in the background

I know mccoist had a lot of questionable tactics at times, but I’d love to have known how he would have done if he was given a proper chance under normal circumstances. Let’s be honest when he was manager no one could have coped under that pressure. If it wasn’t for mccoist during that period %^*& knows where we would have been. Was good to have a rangers man on the inside.

I was gutted it didn’t work out for mccoist. Would have loved him to have became as big a legend as a manager as he was a player
 
gizmico1986 said:
Was about to board a flight to Tenerife that afternoon and my mate sent me a message saying ‘Bye Bye Neil’. I checked my phone and they were three nil down and we had a healthy lead at the top. I had a relaxed near five hour flight to the Canary Islands, safe in the knowledge that they had been pumped and we would take care of St Mirren at home. What a shock I got when I charged my phone at the hotel. That weekend, along with Naismith’s injury was undoubtedly two turning points in that season. Regardless of what was going on behind the scenes I feel if Celtic lost and we won that day, and if Naismith was fit, we would have kept the momentum going to blow them away.
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I've seen us defeated in a fair few games over the years and haven't been in a good mood after it. To that date, I'd never left Ibrox as raging as I was that day and I include OF defeats and cup upsets in that.
 
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dt17 said:
If R9 hadn't got those injuries back in the day. I think he'd be looked at as the greatest ever
.
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some folks are quite dismissive of R9 when compared with the other two, you know whos, but people forget, R9 never had a chance to progress and naturally reach his peak, what he did before injury he did right off the bat when still a teenager it was frightening,world player of the year at 20, you can only hazzard a guess, what an injury free peak R9 whould have been like, what I wouldn't give to watch that:eek:
 
If we hadn’t beat them in semi final warburton era

Would the still be giving it the Ronny roar

It was after that they went and got Rodgers
 
The Queens Park question is one I’ve often pondered. They were possibly the best team in the world at one point, and had the biggest stadium in the World too. If they had gone pro at the same time as the rest of us, I’m sure they would be the most successful club in Scotland, with one or both of us and the Bheasts being at a level not much more than Hearts or Hibs.

Sir Alex is a great one too. He would have been successful, but would he have stayed long term like he did with Man Utd? Would he have the same impact as Souness, but with Scottish players rather than English ones? Would we have attracted investment on the level of Murray and lead to the success of 90s?

One small one I wonder about is, if Mo Johnston had joined them in 1989:
1. Would they have won a title and stopped 9IAR?
2. Who would have been our ‘first’ RC and what would the impact have been?
 
Bluenose_bear said:
Hibs are other what ifs. Had Celtic not formed and stole Hibs players from them, would Hibernian had the massive Irish fan base that Celtic now has?

Am I right in saying that Hibs (and to a lesser extent dundee Hibs, now dundee utd) were the first Irish teams in Scotland?
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They were stolen for charitable purposes
 
If Heysel hadn't happened and English clubs hadn't been banned from European competition for half a decade:
- How would it have affected Rangers? (and Scottish football more generally, if anyone's got thoughts on that)
- How would it have affected European football in late 80s/early 90s?
- Would Everton have enjoyed a period of dominance, perhaps including a European Cup win, that would have set them up better to compete into the early 90s and the Premier League era?
 
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What if MCcoist was never appointed manager and we got someone in who knew how to bring the youngsters through ? which is what I think we should have done !
 
If we had qualified for the CL in 2011, we could have probably avoided administration. I remember seeing the look on Shyte’s face when we lost to Malmö. Little did I know that in reality, the future of the club pretty much hung on us gaining CL money that year.

Still, at least that skidmark won’t be anywhere near Ibrox ever again. Silver linings and all that .
 
What if we had a football governing body that cared and wanted the best for all their clubs and didn’t make us play 4 games in 8 days (or something close to that) prior to the UEFA cup final in Manchester.
 
Newtown Bear said:
What if MCcoist was never appointed manager and we got someone in who knew how to bring the youngsters through ? which is what I think we should have done !
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We played a lot of youngsters, the majority just weren’t very good.

Perry
McLeod
Hegarty
Perry
McKay
Crawford
Aird
Little
Hutton
Naismith

All for a fair whack of game time.

Guys like

Hemmings
Mitchell
Gallagher

Played a few, then guys like Darren Cole, Kyle McCausland and Scott Gallagher all played a few games.

None of the youth players at the time were remotely close to good enough.
 
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