Martin<\/a> – whose side now drop down to the Europa League – said: \u201cYeah, I would [say that I am]. I don’t think I’ve learned anything new tonight.<\/p>\n\u201cI’m just really hurt, really embarrassed by the defeat.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s probably the toughest night I’ve had as head coach and manager. But it doesn’t change the fact that I think we can get this place going, we can get the team going, progress, move forward and grow.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd we have an opportunity to really do that, to feel everything tonight that comes our way and to accept it.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause we have to with the manner of defeat. And then we have a chance to really show some character and some growth and some personality and desire on Sunday.\u201d<\/p>\n
No Rangers side have ever lost by seven goals in a competitive game.<\/p>\n
But it was only the heroic efforts of Jack Butland in goal that spared Martin and his team an unwanted place in the history books.<\/p>\n
They already had a mountain to climb having lost last week\u2019s first leg 3-1.<\/p>\n
It was a calamitous start that did for Martin\u2019s men at Ibrox as they conceded three times inside 20 minutes.<\/p>\n
But even that was surpassed in the shambles stakes as Rangers\u2019 backline imploded.<\/p>\n
It got off to the worst possible start as Nicol Tresoldi headed Brugge ahead after just three minutes.<\/p>\n
Max Aarons\u2019 ludicrous decision to drag Christos Tzolis down while last man then left Gers down to 10 and teetering on a disaster. And that\u2019s how it played out, with the Belgians running riot as they raced to a 5-0 half-time lead.<\/p>\n
Greek ace Tzolis added a sixth Brugge just after the break to confirm a 9-1 aggregate scoreline.<\/p>\n
The fans made their feelings plain but Martin believes he can win them over.<\/p>\n
![\"Nico](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/0_JS378953719.jpg\")
Nico Raskin and his Rangers team-mates at full-time<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, by winning football matches,\u201d he said \u201cWhen it’s got to that point before, maybe there’s been changes and the club’s changed too much and performance has not improved that much or changed too much.<\/p>\n
\u201cI understand it. And as I said, I’m not going to sit here and try to explain in real detail tonight.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have to take everything that’s thrown at me and so do the players, so do the group. But it’s my responsibility as a team, so I have to accept all of it. They won’t affect the work that we do moving forward.<\/p>\n
\u201cI need to get ready for Sunday because that has to be the focus now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Martin was already under pressure after a dismal domestic start that has seen his side kick-off the Premiership season with three successive draws.<\/p>\n
His team now risk falling a huge NINE points adrift of Celtic should they lose Sunday\u2019s derby match at home.<\/p>\n
Asked if a win was essential to keep him in a job, he said: \u201cNot to secure my job, I think we need to win to make ourselves feel better, to make the fans feel better, to actually give them a performance to be proud of. So, all the focus and energy now goes to that.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don’t think we’re going to beat 6-0 again. We qualified through to the Europa League in really difficult circumstances. So tonight was going to be tough.<\/p>\n
\u201cI completely agree that the manner of defeat is not acceptable and really hurtful. But I have no other choice but to keep working and to keep focusing on what’s going to help us moving forward.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe weight of it all at the moment is heavy on the group – we have to try to take it off them and free them up for Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have an amazing opportunity on Sunday. A huge game that means so much to everyone. So I don’t think we could ask for a better game to move forward and to try to build some connection. Because after tonight it’s difficult, it’s damaging.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The shell shocked Ibrox gaffer watched on as his team crashed to a night of shame in Brugge…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":379706,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4100],"tags":[2628,1614,1811,94,1946,28104,132245,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-379705","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-celtic-fc","9":"tag-champions-league","10":"tag-europa-league","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-rangers-fc","13":"tag-russell-martin","14":"tag-scottish-premier-league","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115105125509792169","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379705\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/379706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}