Historical Football Kits

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Rangers

Formed 1873

Founder member of the Scottish Football League 1890

Kit History

Background

In 1872 Peter and Moses McNeill agreed with their friends, Peter Campbell and William McBeath to form a team that played two matches under the name of “Rangers” after an English rugby club. In 1873 the club was formally constituted and their first fixture list drawn up. Their shirts were described as “light blue” to distinguish them from the far more commonplace navy jerseys widely worn at the time although it appears that they adopted white jerseys in 1876-77. Later on, according to John Allan,

"When the late Mr. Angus Campbell was honorary secretary in 1879-80, jerseys with blue and white hoops were adopted. Matters had not been going too well with the team. Mr. Campbell felt his responsibility. He was a true Highlander with a liberal strain of superstition in his being.  A change of colours might change the luck, so, at his suggestion, the old royal blue was packed away in the locker.  Nobody was happy, however, until it was brought out again by a decree of a committee meeting of 1883.  In royal blue the Rangers have played ever since." From the evidence available to us from photographs, it appears that the "royal blue" referred to here was in fact a pale shade more akin to sky blue.

Rangers reached the Scottish Cup final in 1877 and 1879 but on both occasions the village team of Vale of Leven got the better of them (Rangers refused to turn up for the replay in 1879 so Vale were awarded the cup). The first ever Old Firm game with Celtic took place in May 1888 (Celtic won 5-2). Two years later Rangers became founder members of the new Scottish Football League. At the end of the season Rangers and Dumbarton were level on points and a play-off was arranged to decide the championship. When this match was drawn, the title was shared.

In 1894, Rangers won the Scottish Cup for the first time, beating Celtic 3-1. They went on to win the trophy again in 1897 and 1898. In 1898-99 Rangers won all eighteen of their league matches to win the first of four consecutive championships. In December 1899, Rangers moved into the present Ibrox Park, designed by the ubiquitous Archibald Leitch. Three years later tragedy struck and 26 spectators died when a section of terracing collapsed during a Scotland v England international.

In 1903, Rangers won the Scottish Cup for the second time but, remarkably, they would not get their hands on this trophy for another 25 years. Success in the league was not so long in coming, with championships in 1911, 1912, 1913, and 1918.

In 1919 photographic evidence suggests that the rather darker shade of blue familiar to us today was adopted.

Between the wars, Rangers domination of the league was absolute. Under the management of William Struth they won 15 out of the 21 championships played up until the outbreak of World War Two as well as six Scottish Cups, winning the “double” for the first time in 1927-28. On 2nd January 1939, 118,567 fans crammed into Ibrox to watch Rangers beat Celtic 2-1 in the traditional New Year’s Old Firm derby – the highest attendance at a league match ever recorded in the British Isles.

In 1921 Rangers adopted white collars on their shirts and black stockings with red tops. Remarkably, this outfit remained completely unchanged for the next 37 years.

After the Second World War, Rangers took up where they left off winning the first post-war championship and newly created Scottish League Cup and in 1948-49 they won the domestic treble. Rangers continued to dominate throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, amassing eight league titles, seven Scottish FA Cups and four League Cups. The mid 1960s saw the pendulum swing in favour of Celtic and Rangers did not win the league again until 1975.

In 1971 during the traditional New Year’s Day Old Firm match a second disaster occurred at Ibrox when barriers to the rear of passageway 13 collapsed. Sixty-six people lost their lives and more than 200 were injured. As a result, the club set about a major redevelopment of Ibrox, financed by the club’s enormously profitable football pool business. In 1972 Rangers won their first – and so far only – European honour, narrowly beating Moscow Dynamo at the Nou Camp stadium. The occasion was marred by a pitch invasion and clashes with the police which led to Rangers being banned from Europe the following season.

The 1980s were another comparatively bleak spell for the ‘Gers as the “New Firm” of Aberdeen and Dundee United emerged. Rangers' league form slumped and in 1986, the board turned to Graham Souness, appointed as player manager, to turn the club’s fortunes round. The combative Souness reversed the trend of the past century by persuading top English players to move north and in his first season he won the League and Cup double. The revolution was completed when Souness’ friend David Murray became the club’s new owner in November 1988. Over the next ten years Murray oversaw the investment of £90m on players and £52m on the stadium. The impact was profound and between 1989 and 1997, Rangers won a record nine championships in a row.

Since the millennium, Rangers and Celtic have more or less shared the honours but the big prize of a European trophy continues to elude both clubs.

In recent years both Rangers and Celtic have bowed to pressure distance themselves from their sectarian history and clamp down on the behaviour of their fans. Rangers were originally identified with the Presbyterian establishment while Celtic’s roots lay with the impoverished Catholic Irish immigrants living in the city's east end. In nineteenth century Scotland there was nothing unusual in this but the sectarian connections of most clubs faded away over time. This was not the case for the Old Firm whose rivalry was fuelled by the sharp divisions between the catholic and protestant traditions which the West of Scotland shares with Ulster. At its worst, the clubs became the focus of bigotry and hatred from both communities and Old Firm matches were generally disfigured by the singing of sectarian songs and violence. It was widely held that Rangers would not sign Catholic players until Graham Souness publicly renounced the club’s “unwritten policy” in 1989 when he signed ex-Celtic player, Mo Johnston. In fact, around twenty Catholics had played for the club although none of these was prepared to acknowledge their faith publicly.

Rangers’ record is, quite literally, second to none. They are by some distance the most successful club in Scotland having amassed (by 2007) 51 League championships and 107 trophies, both world records. They have won the domestic treble a record seven times and have competed in Europe more times than any other British club. The club's badge now features five small stars - one for every ten championships.

Sources

• (a) Alick Milne
• (b) The Glasgow Story
• (c) Dundee FC - Images of Sport (Paul Lunney 2001)
• (d) London Hearts
• (e) Aberdeen FC Images of Sport (Paul Lunney 2000)
• (f) Rangers Official Site
• (g) empics
• (h) Airdrieonians FC - Images of Sport (Brian Bollen 2002)
• (i) The Story of The Rangers - Fifty Years' Football 1873-1923 (John Allan)
• (j) Stephen Alford
• (k) Christoher Worrall
• (l) Rangers History Project - this independent site, set up in June 2007, has an fine collection of old team photographs.
• (m) SNS Pix
• (n) jumpers4goalposts
• (o) Alexander Perkin