Well done, Jambos; So long, Eck.

Congratulations to Heart of Midlothian Football club. Well done, Hearts.

Their 1-0 win over Aberedeen tonight confirms that the Gorgie side will after all get a crack at the Champions League. Domestic league tables, like Champions League tables, never lie - they deserve it.

Well done to Gretna too - they’ll be in the UEFA cup next season … with us, with Rangers.

Had it not been at our expense I would be exultant that the Jambolinos have not only broken the decade-long Old Firm monopoly on the top two places of the top Scottish league but that, after 46 years of waiting, they’ll have the chance to once again grace a tournament worthy of their proud, huge support and their place in the Scottish game.

Because it is indeed at our expense, I’m sad. It hurts. It hurts almost as much that we’ve finished third for the first time in 18 years as it does that we won’t be playing in the Champions League next season. The two events are directly connected but are very seperate in the mind of the long-term fan.

Yeah, yeah - I know - we could go all the way in the UEFA cup because it’s a vastly easier tournament and maybe Le Guen will prefer some time to rebuild without the added pressure of Europe’s out-and-out elite coming to Ibrox on week nights but (1) playing in the European Cup is always far more of a privilege than a pressure and (2) in terms of true cred and real excitement, actually winning the UEFA Cup outright is the only thing which can beat playing in the Champions League - lifting the secondary European trophy is not beyond us but it is still a bloody tall order.

And (3) that’s all for next season (if Le Guen even comes! He might noh be interested if there’s nae CL fitbaw on the go at The Brox!): Sometimes ye just have to face up to the campaign still at hand - even if it is flat-lining before our very eyes.

I’m dissapointed - maybe a bit gutted - and very hurt. But There’s not bitterness directed towards The Hearts.

If I’m angry at all it’s towards Rangers ourselves. I would have been ecstatic tonight if, as we’d all predicted at the start of the season, Celtic were the old firm side edged out of the top two places to make way for Hearts. I’d love nothing more than a possible Gers-jambos Champions League quarter-final.

No, the only people we have to blame is Rangers. And, to be honest, I can’t even be bothered getting bitter about that.

Alex McLeish has, once again, proven why he will always be the forgotten “hero” of Rangers managers.

Brought in at a time of great change and cost-cutting - with most of the fans of no disposition to take the economics into consideration when the game being played in front of them wasn’t going our way - he did what he was meant to do: He broke even.

The fact that he did no more is unacceptable to most Gers fans but, maybe, in a decade or so, when we realise that he held our image and our pride together when times were bad - that he prevented a Celtic “six-in-a-row”, that he kept us pitching in with the odd title and plenty of cups as well as one of the great European runs of our history, and that he did it all with a dignity befitting Bill Struth himself - maybe then Eck’ll get the recognition he deserves … as we’re basking in our sixth consecutive Champions League title under Paul Le Guen :-)

McLeish was brought in because he was cheap, at a time when some Rangers fans were very publicly bemoaning the scatter-cash Advocaat era. He had only the smallest European football experience - as a coach - and had managed only Motherwell and Hibs, proud clubs but nothing compared to Rangers.

Considering all this and what he had to work with, his unwritten remit was clearly: “Keep us hanging in there - don’t let us have two bad seasons on the trot.”

He didn’t. He’s despised by some Gers fans because he couldn’t give us two good seasons on the trot but - hey - the man has given us enough to guide us from the millionaire’s playground era of Advocaat to the Meaning Business Again era of Le Guen.

He joined half way through 2001/2002 - the SPL title was already beyond us so he won both cups and did celtic in the two of them for good measure: Next season he won the treble - to break even, in 2003/2004, he won fuck-all and lost 5 times to celtic: Time for a pick-me-up: We win the league and the League Cup in 2004/2005. Back on an even keel, he then guides us to history in the Champions League and two or three of the most exciting nights of my football-supporting life:

Tonight, in failing to finish next to celtic in the SPL, McLeish evened out the over-achievement in the Champions League.

We all know we were just one or two less-than-criminal performances away from overhauling Hearts. We all know it’s not good enough. We all know a truly great manager would have wrested the four or five extra points we needed to save domestic face this campaign. But Alex’s away now and, hopefully, Paul is arriving. On Sunday I think we should focus on the good times Eck gave us and the good times ahead. And as we see the jambos take to the pitch after finishing above us for the first time in 18 years we can all hope that we’re now watching the two teams which will monopolise the Scottish game for the next decade or so: As long as Hearts monopolise second and we take first, first, first, first, first, first…

Tonight marks a real low but let’s all get together to ensure it’s forgotten pretty bloody sharpish.