The Ibrox Covid five will have plenty of time on their hands to think about what they have done while they are sitting in isolation on their respective naughty steps.
But they’ll need to figure out a heck of plan to get back in to their manager’s good books.
Steven Gerrard would not have wanted to have to deal with this kind of nonsense the week of a crucial Europa League tie where his Rangers side are looking to make the last 16 of the Europa League for the second year on the spin.
Three of the players involved could have been involved in some capacity against Royal Antwerp in Belgium tonight.
Instead they will be lucky to play for the club again.
Bongani Zungu, Nathan Patterson, Calvin Bassey, Dapo Mebude and Brian Kinnear were left in no doubt about the severity of their situation by Gerrard on Wednesday.
The response from their gaffer was calculated and considered. It wasn’t hysterical or too lenient. It was a manager who is in full control, a manager who has been badly let down and one prepared to be decisive to send out a message to the rest of his squad that stepping out of line in the current situation simply will not be tolerated.
Rangers and Gerrard have come too far this season to be undermined by players acting like daft wee boys.
In fairness, that’s what most of them are. Bassey is 21, and a long way from home. Patterson is just 19, as is Medube, while Kinnear is 20.
They might be playing in man’s game, but they are still just kids. Goodness knows how old duffers like yours truly would have coped with all this Covid carry on when we were their age.
Not well, I suspect. It’s a miracle there hasn’t been more widespread breaches in a sport played mostly by folk in their 20s.
Gerrard is bang on to take a hard line but there will also be a human element to all of this.
Young people make mistakes. They all do.
Guys like Patterson will probably be distraught right now. This is a lad who has been touted for big things at Ibrox. He’s looked the part every time he’s been given a nod and his future looked so bright he needs to wear shades around Auchenhowie.
He’ll need to keep the head down for the foreseeable and work harder than he has even done before to come in from the cold, but this doesn’t need to be a career killer.
Take the dunts, learn the lesson, and for goodness sake keep the noses clean from nose on.
Zungu, at 28, should probably know better and his backside might take an extra blootering.
At a time when he should be knuckling down and forcing his way in to the starting XI every week, he’s managed to sink his Gers career before it’s really started.
It won’t have been easy for him making the move to Scotland in the middle of a pandemic, but in case he hadn’t noticed, the rest of us can’t see our mammies whether they live in Jordanhill or Johannesburg.
While there’s no need for public flogging, there’s still no excuse for breaking the rules that everyone else is struggling with as well.
Football is on a knife edge right now. The politicians jump on every opportunity they get to make an example of the game as it allows them to deflect from the headlines they don’t want to see about other issues.
Whether we like it or not, football has to be squeaky clean right now as the game is held up to a higher standard than any other occupation.
If a couple of brickies get caught at a party, the government don’t threaten to pull the plug on the whole industry.
If it fair? Hardly. But that’s the way it is and we need to get on with it.
It’ll be a harsh lesson for the Ibrox Five, just as it was for the previous two, the Aberdeen Eight, and Boli Bolingoli, but we have to hope the penny drops for everyone else.
Gerrard can do no more at his club.
One thing is for sure, if the rest of the Rangers squad can produce a performance as controlled and assured as their manager dealing with this nonsense yesterday, they’ll have one foot in the last 16.
