Andrew Cavenagh Reflects on Disappointment at Rangers
Andrew Cavenagh leans into the word “disappointment” like it’s a debt still to be paid.
A year on from the day his consortium, backed by 49ers Enterprises, took control at Rangers, the chairman is fronting up to a season that delivered no trophies, no comfort and a brutal reminder of how unforgiving Glasgow can be.
“It’s left a terrible taste in everyone’s mouths,” he has already admitted. He did not soften that this week. He doubled down on it.
A year of upheaval, and no silver
Twelve months ago, Rangers sold a new era. Fresh investment, American money, big ambition. Cavenagh and 49ers Enterprises arrived with the language of modern ownership and the promise of a reset.
What followed was chaos.
Russell Martin came in as head coach in June and was gone by October. The clear-out did not stop there: chief executive Patrick Stewart and sporting director Kevin Thelwell were both removed the following month as the club tried to wrench the steering wheel back under control.
Danny Rohl stepped into the wreckage and, for a while, revived the title fight. Rangers surged, clawed their way back into contention and briefly looked capable of turning a shambles into a story of recovery.
Then the season collapsed again.
They lost four of their final five games, the challenge disintegrated and the campaign ended as it had begun – with a sense of opportunity squandered and a support left staring at rivals celebrating instead.
All of it came after a spend of up to £40m on players. No trophy. No consolation.
“This club gets into you at the molecular level”
With that backdrop, the obvious question followed: was it worth it? At any point in this grim first year, did Cavenagh wonder why he had bothered?
“No, is the answer,” he said, without hesitation.
“This club gets into you at the molecular level. And, once it's done, you're done. It's happened to me and a bunch of us.”
He refuses to dress the season up. There is no attempt to claim he enjoyed any of it.
“I don't ever want to use the words ‘enjoy’ or ‘fun’ because you can't have a season like we've had and use those words,” he said.
What he does embrace is the fight. The grind. The sense that failure, if handled correctly, can be weaponised.
“The challenge is something I relish and Paraag [Marathe] relishes with the rest of us,” Cavenagh added, name-checking the fellow American from the San Francisco 49ers Enterprises group who briefly served as vice-chairman.
“The disappointment this year is very real for us, but all it's done is provide motivation for us going forward.”
He believes this hurt will “spur us on to where we want to get to” and “make success sweeter”. That is the bet. That this season, with all its anger and waste, becomes a foundation rather than a warning.
On the streets, in the stands
If Cavenagh has learned anything about Rangers in year one, it has not come solely from boardrooms or briefing notes. It has come from the people who turn up.
He has made a point of engaging with match-going supporters, sometimes in the rawest possible moments. Most recently, he was seen speaking with fans at the final fixture of the season at Falkirk, taking soundings from a support that does not hold back.
“My conversations with our supporters, I've really come to enjoy,” he said.
He knows how that sounds after a season like this, and he knows the scale of the task. Someone advised him to get to know fans “on a one-by-one basis”. At Falkirk, amid the noise and the anger, he accepted that was hardly realistic.
But he keeps going back to those interactions, because they strip the situation down to its essentials.
“Whether it's in the stands or the streets, we all share certain things like the ambition to win and the understanding that we're not good enough,” he said.
That line – “we're not good enough” – lands heavily. It is not framed as a debate. It is a shared diagnosis between board and terrace.
“The common goal is the same so there's common ground in those conversations even if there are disagreements over methods.”
And that is where Rangers stand now. A chairman obsessed, a fanbase restless, a club still bruised by a year that went badly wrong. The money has been spent, the mistakes have been made, the excuses have run out.
The only question left is whether this “molecular” pull Cavenagh talks about can drag Rangers back to where they insist they belong – or whether another year of disappointment is already taking shape.
