Rangers begins long road to the top

At this time last year manager Ally McCoist was struggling to add to his squad ahead of its UEFA Champions League qualifiers amid suspicion that owner Craig Whyte could not deliver the financial promises he made during his takeover months earlier.

A year on and Rangers is heading for liquidation, while the club that is looking to emerge from the debris remains unable to play football or sign players.

What we do know is that the new Rangers - which is still to formally adopt the title until legal matters are completed later this month - will play in the Third Division, if anywhere.

Such a prospect looked highly unlikely when Charles Green's Sevco Scotland company announced it had bought Rangers' assets for £5.5 million ($8.3 million) on 14 June.

But overwhelming public opinion scuppered first an attempt to join the Clydesdale Bank Premier League and then plans to put them in the First Division.

Most, if not all, of Scotland's senior clubs could be seriously hit financially from the fall-out but the Ibrox club has not necessarily hit rock-bottom yet.

Sevco was still looking to secure Rangers's Scottish Football Association membership just over a week before the team was due to kick off against Brechin in the Ramsdens Cup first round.

It might have to accept a 12-month transfer embargo handed to the 'old' Rangers in April over the club's failure to pay millions of pounds in tax under Whyte.

Manager Ally McCoist had already lost a full team of players who did not want to play for the new company and Green admitted this week that Carlos Bocanegra, Maurice Edu and Dorin Goian are likely to follow them out the door.

McCoist retains internationals such as Neil Alexander, Lee McCulloch, Alejandro Bedoya and Lee Wallace but it is difficult to see how the latter two can maintain their international prospects, and their wages, in the Third Division.

McCoist has said a transfer ban is not feasible but the SFA would have to overrule its disciplinary procedures if it is to wipe it out. The ban was ruled unlawful in the Court of Session under challenge from Rangers but the alternative punishment could be suspension or termination of membership if the case reverts to the SFA's independent appeal tribunal.

Further complication comes in the form of the £3 million in debts owed to football clubs that Rangers were unable to pay back.

The SFA has stipulated that Sevco must take on the debt and complaints from the likes of Rapid Vienna, which is owed £1 million from the sale of Nikica Jelavic, would likely spark a FIFA transfer embargo if the money was not paid.

McCoist will have to rely on youth players but the squad he has at the moment, if supplemented heavily by young players, should still comfortably win the part-time Third Division.

The club has been linked with moves for the likes of Craig Beattie, Ian Black and Fran Sandaza - who would walk into any other SPL side other than Celtic - despite remaining under embargo.

But Rangers made a failed bid for Norwich City striker Grant Holt two weeks before going into administration and Sevco held talks with Gennaro Gattuso's agent earlier this northern summer when there was no chance of either player signing, and the new company's financial prospects remain uncertain.

With a lack of season-ticket income and reduced revenue from the league fate, Green has told staff to expect job losses, which were largely avoided after Rangers went into administration in February.

Green has already rejected several bids for the club since taking over with former Rangers player John Brown determined to launch another with financial support from fans, who remain highly sceptical of Sevco's intentions.

The off-field drama will continue with liquidators set to investigate financial matters in the final years of the 'old' Rangers existence, while police probe Whyte's takeover.

Sir David Murray's full role in the downfall of Rangers will also be easier to quantify when a tax tribunal rules on the club's use of Employee Benefit Trusts from 2001 to 2010.

The scheme is the focus of an SPL investigation into alleged undisclosed payments to players, which could see Rangers stripped of titles.

Amidst all of the continuing turmoil, McCoist and his fellow Rangers fans, and the players, are desperate to seek respite in football.

Brechin's Glebe Park, replete with a hedge along one side of the pitch, is now the first step on the long road back to normality for those people who have been helpless in the whole fiasco.

McCoist was signing international players up to the last few hours before the Champions League opener against Malmo last season.

After the turmoil of the intervening 12 months, this July he will just be relieved to get a squad of players kitted out in light blue jerseys for any game as he looks to begin the long journey back for his team.