Pat Nevin: 'Ignore the fury over fixtures, this is a golden season for us'

I THINK I have found a new national sport where we can comfortably compete with the very best, personal foot shooting.

Over the past couple of weeks I have lost count of how many times the current national sport has been called a joke, or a laughing stock, while the rest of us have been totally immersed in the excitement of a gripping title race.

Maybe it is because I was out of the country last week that it looked so much clearer, that far from feeling depressingly embarrassed we should actually be on a giddy high right now. In among the abounding conspiracy theories, the arguments with the SFA and the SPL and the furious broadsides from club chairmen, has anybody actually mentioned that we are in the midst of yet another extraordinary climax to a season?

Even now would anyone be able to say with certainty who will actually finish where in the top six of the SPL? In 2003 it went down to the wire when Celtic beat Killie and Rangers overcame Dunfermline to clinch it on goal difference by a single strike. Then there was the unforgettable late, late show from Motherwell's Scott McDonald in 2005 to snatch the title away from Celtic at Fir Park in the dying minutes while Rangers won at Easter Road.

I would not be in the slightest bit surprised if this one is just as nail biting because any of the other four are capable of taking points of the Old Firm from now on in, including Hibs at Celtic today. In their last 14 league games before this weekend the Old Firm between them have only won once by more than a single goal. What's more each provincial club is trying to take on Celtic and Rangers with attractive and attacking football, in teams liberally sprinkled with talented young Scottish players.

I accept that a good old moan can be cathartic for some, but over the past few months I have enjoyed some of the most intense sporting occasions I have seen in years thanks to the apparently desperate Scottish game. The more controlled cerebral offerings by Rangers in Europe were just as tense in their way as the mania surrounding the recent Old Firm double-header. In the midst of all this do not forget the enthralling and uplifting 4-3 win by Queen of the South against Aberdeen in the Scottish Cup semi-final at Hampden giving us the romantic and intriguing final against the omnipresent Rangers.

The reason why it will be intriguing is the same reason why every game will be engrossing until May 24. Queens, just like Hibs, Dundee United, Motherwell and Aberdeen all spotted opportunities because they could sense the tiredness of Rangers in particular. Of course the SPL title isn't going outside Glasgow in the foreseeable future but even that doesn't make us a laughing stock as only two or three clubs consistently win trendiest leagues around Europe, in England, Spain and Italy.

So if the much-maligned SPL probably deserves a better press than it gets, then chairman Lex Gold and secretary Iain Blair definitely deserve a better press than they have endured of late. There is no doubt, and they knew it, that whatever they had done in the circumstances around fixturing they were going to infuriate one party or another.

The headlines may scream about David Murray complaining, but how many of the rest are really that angry? The majority understand the difficulty but it should be underlined that end of season congestion isn't a new thing, even if this is an extreme example.

As a player you care little about the furore and just get on with the day-to-day preparation for matches accepting that circumstances sometimes make it a tiring, especially when you are successful. I recall playing a league game for Chelsea on the Saturday and then popping up to Wembley for a cup final against Manchester City on the Sunday and thinking little of it. On another occasion the league insisted our last game was played, come what may, on the final available evening of the official season. What followed was farcical as most of the pitch was under at least an inch of water. We just got on with that one as well and I am sure Rangers will not have to face either of those two scenarios.

Now don't get me wrong, I have every sympathy with Rangers' predicament, but sometimes you just have to accept that you can't have everything you want. For years the top English sides have taken a relaxed attitude to the League Cup and even the FA Cup is now clearly third in their list of priorities and as such they are used to resting and blooding players accordingly.

If the SPL and the UEFA Cup are considered the most important then maybe fringe men like John Fleck, Alan Gow and dare I say it, Kris Boyd should be pencilled in for the Scottish Cup final. Walter Smith has already done that to a degree in the earlier rounds with the likes of Chris Burke and Steven Naismith featuring more regularly back then.

That is what a good manager does and Walter almost always acts with intelligence, integrity and a deal of understanding. It is just a shame that the noises coming out of Ibrox in the last week or so have unnecessarily added to the pressure on those at the SPL beavering away to make the best of a bad situation not of their making.

I have worked with the aforementioned Gold and Blair and can tell you right now there are no conspiracies. They have worked long and hard with the fixture problems to provide the best possible solutions in almost impossible circumstances.

They were even pilloried for their inventive idea of the two fixture lists, depending on whether or not Rangers got to the UEFA Cup final. For me this was good helpful creative thinking, for others it was indecisive at best. The thing is I haven't seen any better options being provided by the harshest critics of their plan.

In the midst of the rancour it is worth stepping back and surveying the landscape of Scottish football. Rangers reaching Manchester is the icing on a cake that was tasty enough following the exploits of Celtic and Aberdeen in Europe. I bet AC Milan, Shakhtar Donetsk, Lokomotiv Moscow and FC Copenhagen do not think Scottish football is a joke and France, Italy and Ukraine haven't spent much time laughing at us either over the past year, but we continue to sneer at ourselves.

Over the next couple of weeks, no matter who you support in the top half of the SPL, there could still be something to get excited about. For the time being the days of early European exits, embarrassing internationals and summary thrashings of any Scottish side that turns up in Glasgow to face the old firm, are in the past. For me that is good news and I am determined to sit back and enjoy the spectacles to come, even if some might think mine are rose tinted.

Final thoughts

Arthur Numan

Rangers player 1998-2003

It is unbelievable. If you compare the Rangers team of my era to the one now, ours was stronger because of the prices the club paid for the players at the time. What the current squad has achieved, though, is fantastic. It is maybe not always pretty but they get the results and they can write history for themselves by winning the UEFA Cup. And winning is all that matters. If people are able to look back and see Rangers won the UEFA Cup in 2008 they will not be interested in how the games went.

I obviously know Dick Advocaat and I know the way he likes to play and have been very impressed with Zenit. Well organised and with players behind the ball, when they are in possession they come out with great pace. They get two, three players up from midfield in no time at all.

It will be a very interesting match-up because Rangers are also well organised and they get bodies behind the ball too. When they have it they try to come out. It will be interesting to see which team takes the initiative. It could be a cat and mouse type of situation. The first 20 minutes of the tie should tell us the answer.

Andy Cameron

Comedian and lifelong Rangers fan

I was at Rangers' previous three finals in Europe but what I love about this one is picking up on the excitement of my daughter, who will be going to her first. After the semi-final I was a bit flat and I was saying to her 'I wish we had won with a great goal or great bit of play' and she just said to me: 'Dad, we are in a European final' and then suddenly it hit me what an achievement it was.

If Rangers were playing Brazil in the morning and Celtic at night I would expect them to win both games because I always have hope in this great club. And I hope that every year they can make an impression abroad, although when Darch (Jean-Claude Darcheville) put that one over the bar and Lyon went up the park and scored in the last Champions League tie I thought 'well, that is that for our big nights in Europe for another year'.

But they have tumbled down on top of one another in recent months because Walter Smith and his players have buckets of will and determination. As pre-match announcer at Ibrox I see all the lads in the tunnel as they prepare to go out and their focus is incredible.

They are a team in the truest sense. It is a group that gives everything for each other and their club and that is the reason they could be quadruple winners in the next few weeks.

Robert McElroy

Author of 'Enduring Dream; Fifty Years Of Rangers In Europe'

In the last sentence of my book I reflected on the club having reached three European finals between 1961 and 1972 and posed the question: 'Will we ever see another?' If I am being honest, I would have answered 'no'. I never thought I would be able to look forward to such an occasion again.

I was a wee boy when Fiorentina came to Ibrox for the first leg of the 1960-61 Cup Winners' Cup and my schooldays prevented me travelling to Nuremberg for the final against Bayern Munich in 1967. It was thrilling to see them finally win a European trophy over Moscow Dynamo in Barcelona five years later.

Wednesday's final offers Rangers a chance to become the first Scottish club to lift two of the major European honours. Unlike Celtic, they could one day complete the set... even if the Champions League might appear out of reach.