OPINION
Adrian Durham was spot on with his explanation on why Rangers shouldn’t give Celtic a guard of honour when the pair clash at Ibrox on Sunday.
The Scottish Sun recently reported that the Gers had decided not to even consider giving the Hoops a guard of honour despite it being traditional to applaud the title winners.
While many are likely up in arms over Rangers’ decision as it goes against tradition, Durham explained why the Gers were perhaps justified not to line up to clap Neil Lennon’s side.
“They won’t be giving champions Celtic a guard of honour at Ibrox on Sunday and now on the face of it and indeed my initial reaction was that it’s the classy thing to provide the guard of honour to salute the champions,” said Durham on talkSPORT (17:45, Wednesday May 8th).
“And some are saying it would be a positive step on the steep almost an impossible step up towards peace and harmony in Scotland across the divided Glasgow, well it would make no dent in reality whatsoever would it?
“It wouldn’t stop the hatred so why delude yourselves into thinking that it might, let’s be honest if went around asking every Rangers player if a guard of honour would come from the heart, they’d all laugh in your face.
“Honestly do any of you think that any Rangers player respects Scott Brown? No they don’t, of course they don’t so why ask them to pretend that they do.”
It does seem a shame that the rivalry between the Gers and Celtic is so strong that a guard of honour won’t happen, but Durham is spot-on with his verdict about why it doesn’t really matter.
No Rangers player is going to deep down respect their rivals for winning the league title any more by doing a guard of honour and it’s not going to see supporters bond over this show of respect.
If anything a guard of honour is more likely going to rile up unhappy Rangers fans and that is something that doesn’t need to happen, considering both set of supporters are already passionate enough about the Old Firm Derby.
So with this mind, Durham does seem to have hit the nail on the head by changing his mind in order to support Rangers’ decision.