The mood around Celtic Park and Ibrox is very different at the moment. One side sits nine points clear at the top of the Premiership table, and has won 14 of the 15 league games that they have played this season despite having to deal with a relentless schedule and injuries to key players. The other team have pretty much dropped the ball in recent weeks and months, and are closer to third placed Aberdeen than they are to first.
Thus, it is not hard to understand why the future of Giovanni van Bronckhorst at the Rangers is up in the air at the moment. The fans already seem to have given up on him, while it looks like the Dutch manager himself is feeling the pressure and quickly running out of ideas to turn the situation around.
If the Rangers are going to make a change in the managerial hot seat, the World Cup break might be the perfect opportunity to do that and give the new manager time to settle into his new surroundings.
But there has been pretty much complete silence around the situation. As reported by the Daily Record, Dutch football insider Marcel van der Kraan reckons that the Rangers will stand by Van Bronckhorst. He said:
"“I think he’s counting on the fact he will be there once the World Cup is over. He’s gone on holiday at the moment, he is aware that there is some unrest among the fans.“But if you look at the way he entered the club…Rangers is a massive club in Scotland and has a reputation in Europe, you can see that with how they went to the Europa League Final.“He had very little to invest, but they carried on in the Champions League this season. They played against all the big teams with a very limited squad, and that squad was not built for the Champions League, and the Scottish league, and the cup (all at once).“Ten injuries at the moment, he knows he has to work harder with his team, but he needs players. He has the backing of the board very much, and he is counting on the backing of the board, because they have not invested any more, and if you see the amount of injuries they’ve had, it would be very unfair to sack him.”"
Celtic fans delighted with latest Van Bronckhorst news
It remains to be seen if the Rangers do stand beside their manager and former player or not. It is certainly an interesting situation at Ibrox.
Of course, the news has been met with a lot of positivity by the Celtic fans, who would be quite content to see Van Bronckhorst remain in the Ibrox hot seat, considering how things have been going for them in recent weeks and months.
The Hoops would love nothing more than to put the title race completely beyond the Rangers as soon as possible. Of course, at the same time, they cannot rest on their laurels, there is a lot of football left to be played and anything can happen in football.