Former Ajax manager Aad de Mos has claimed Rangers were too small a club to participate in the Champions League this year as he backed the sacked Giovanni van Bronckhorst.

The Ibrox club suffered the worst group stage ever in the history of the competition as they lost all six of their matches and posted a goal difference of -20.

The record ultimately was the writing on the wall for Van Bronckhorst who was sacked this week after also suffering in the Scottish Premiership.

The hunt is now on for a new manager, but De Mos has sympathy for his fellow countryman.

He told Soccernews.nl: "You can't entirely blame Van Bronckhorst. Rangers are always compared to Celtic in Scotland. Celtic play better football and have better players.

"Rangers were too small for the Champions League, they would have been better off playing in the Europa League.

"It was a flattering victory over PSV. In football you have no guarantees whether you stay or not, you start at zero."

Meanwhile, Kenny Miller believes QPR boss Michael Beale should feature prominently on the shortlist to replace Giovanni van Bronckhorst as Rangers manager.

“There’s loads of names that spring to mind, you’ve got the likes of Sean Dyche who’s got connections to (Rangers sporting director) Ross Wilson, the same with Ralph Hasenhuttl,” Miller told Sky Sports.

“One for me that would be right at the top of the list would be Michael Beale. His name’s been bandied about over the last month while Rangers have been toiling.

“I think he fits, he knows the club, he knows the players. There would be no surprises with him walking back into the building in terms of the demands and the expectations of the football club and he’s started off his own journey as a manager pretty well as well so I think he’d be right at the top of the list.”


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