Rangers

Alex McLeish: 'Rangers fans must keep faith in Pedro Caixinha'

By Giuseppe Labellarte, Reporter | 05 July 2017

Alex McLeish wants the Rangers supporters to back Pedro Caixinha after their Europa League humiliation at the hands of Luxembourg club Progres Niederkorn.

Alex McLeish has urged Rangers fans to back Pedro Caixinha after their Europa League humiliation at the hands of Luxembourg club Progres Niederkorn.

Gers lost 2-1 on aggregate in the first round of Europa League qualifying after a 2-0 defeat in the second leg on Tuesday, and the Portuguese manager has already accepted blame for the loss.

McLeish, who won seven trophies as Rangers manager from 2001 to 2006, including a domestic treble, labelled the result as the worst in the club's history.

However, he believes that Caixinha should now be given time to see his new summer signings bed in after being given licence by the Ibrox board to completely re-shuffle the squad.

"Let's not get away from it - it is an awful, awful result and probably the worst in Rangers' history. They used to go on about a Berwick Rangers result in 1967 but this is a shocker," he told Sky Sports News.

"It is a shocking result to lose to Luxembourg minnows but the fans still have to get behind Pedro Caixinha because he is there for the considerable future and you have to give him the support that Rangers fans have always afforded their managers in the beginning, including myself.

"[The reaction] will be really tough for him and he won't know what's hit him and in much the same way as Mark Warburton last year. Mark was astonished by the backlash when they lost 5-1 to Celtic in the first Old Firm game of the season. That really hit him hard and he didn't really know that kind of backlash would have been so intense but that is the challenge when you go to a club like Rangers."

Rangers had been hoping to reach the main stages of a European competition for the first time since the 2010-11 campaign.