An experienced figurehead in the dugout, Lawrence Shankland spearheading the attack and further financial backing - there are few excuses for Rangers this season.

The Derek McInnes era at Rangers kicks off with a Scottish Premiership curtain-raiser at Dundee United on Friday (20:00 BST) The climactic end to the Scottish Premiership, coupled with the summer of football and managerial upheaval that followed, has made it somewhat easy to forget that Rangers finished last term third. A lot has happened since head coach Danny Rohl, who has been replaced by Derek McInnes, watched his team limp to the finish after their season unravelled in a post-split collapse. They are expecting far better from a club that followed up a reported £40m spending spree with a second successive trophyless season. But as the McInnes era prepares to kick into gear, are those same supporters heading into the new campaign with fewer reasons to fear more failure? It was only a year ago that Russell Martin had just started his troublesome 17-match reign as Rangers head coach. Now Leicester City boss, Martin was sacked after a brutal end to his brief spell. And after dragging the side back into the Premiership title fight before it all went wrong, Rohl too has been and gone, leaving for Red Bull Salzburg in June. The nature of Rangers' end to last season - their hopes ending with four straight post-split defeats - meant Rohl would have been up against it with the fans on day one of the 2026-27 campaign.