Pedro Caixinha confronts angry Rangers fans outside the stadium after Europa League defeat to part-timers Progres Niederkorn.
Pedro Caixinha was pictured confronting angry Rangers fans outside the stadium following his side’s humiliating 2-0 defeat to Progres Niederkorn in Europa League qualification.
Gers exited the tournament 2-1 on aggregate in the first qualifying round after being knocked out by a team who have never progressed past the first hurdle in any European competition in their history and have an aggregate scoring record of three for and 41 against.
After the match Caixinha was seen outside the Stade Jos Haupert in Niederkorn talking to the supporters, who were understandably outraged by the result.
Caixinha took full responsibility for the loss straight after the game, but gave no hint that he considered his position at Ibrox under threat.
“If I’m not showing strength to move the things forward then I couldn’t be in this chair, so I’m strongly convinced I can do it,” the Portuguese was quoted by the Scottish Sun.
“I assume all the responsibility not to pass this qualifier and to miss out on the group stages that was our main goal.
“But I know this group is going to be on the top again and is going to build very good things for the club.
“One word for the fans, they are the only ones that don’t deserve this sort of thing.
“They need to be angry at this moment and we understand they are angry but we ask them to keep believing in the team and have loyalty because the team will come good.
“It is totally the worst result of my managerial career.”
New Rangers manager Pedro Caixinha in the stands
Whether or not Caixinha can recover from losing to a part-time team who finished fourth in the Luxembourg National Division last season remains to be seen.
The 46-year-old certainly has some work to do ahead of the 2017/18 campaign if he wants to get Rangers back to competing effectively at domestic and European level.
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