What happens next to Ally?

Nov 23 2008 Gordon Waddell

ROLL videotape. On screen, images of Walter Smith walking out of Ibrox for the final time.

Back in the Question of Sport studio Sue Barker looks over, a glint in her eye as ever.

Okay Ally's team: What happens next?

For once in his life, though, McCoist can't play it for laughs. This is deadly serious. This is his future he's looking at.

No-one ever said there was anything wrong with being thrown in at the deep end.

As his track record shows, Ally normally comes up for air with a salmon in either pocket.

But has Sir David Murray just given him a concrete warm-up jacket to wear when he jumps in?

Friday morning's papers were full of it, the chairman's big sparkly lottery finger pointing straight at the Rangers assistant manager with the message: "It's YOU!"

The chosen one. The prodigal. Half of which qualifies McCoist for the job in some people's eyes.

And yes, you can understand Murray's symbolic handover of the keys to his favourite car to the man next in line amid the emotion of the chairman's 20th anniversary celebrations.

Is his man ready to drive it, though? That's the question they both need to ask themselves this morning.

Firstly, if there's a more popular man in Scotland than Ally I'd love to meet him. Not just in football. Anywhere.

He crosses boundaries, puts an instant smile on faces no matter what room he walks in to. He has the charisma to do whatever he wants in life.

And what Ally wants to do is manage Rangers. Successfully.

So he has been learning his trade for four years now, two as a part-timer under Smith and Tommy Burns for 16 games with Scotland, another two in the thick of it full-time at Ibrox.

The former Gers striker is serious about his business, more than he was as a player. He loves the game, understands it. He's enthused about learning it even if he hasn't yet the qualifications to manage at the top level.

Ally (right) has worked hard to rid himself of the "never on time but you have to love me anyway" cheeky chappy reputation.

He wants responsibility and wants to be seen handling it. He's as passionate about his club as anyone in the stands.

But as Smith would tell him in a heartbeat there's a world of a difference between being an assistant maager and being solely responsible for one of Europe's biggest football insitutions. And that's why you wonder if Murray did McCoist any favours last week on two fronts.

One, the pressure it puts on Ally to take his first steps as a proper manager and be able to walk on water. And two, the pressure it puts on Rangers to win the league this season.

In the first instance that's what will be expected of him - the same with any Rangers manager.

You're not allowed a learning curve or transition. Honeymoons are for newlyweds.

Obviously Ally wouldn't be the first assistant to make the jump. Smith did it in 1991 when Graeme Souness walked out.

But by then Walter had been coaching for around 15 years under the tutelage of Jim McLean and Alex Ferguson, masters of the art.

Smith had served his time, knew what it was all about.

You could argue legends such as Souness and Kenny Dalglish stepped straight in to the dugout from the pitch and succeeded, I suppose. But KD had the legendary Anfield boot room at his back. Souness had Smith.

That's no disrespect to Kenny McDowall who's one of football's most respected coaches and a top lad. But he's Ally's contemporary, not a father figure.

That's all for the future though. Part two's the bit that must concern McCoist.

Because as I said at the start of the season, if Rangers don't win the title Walter walks. He witnessed one flag loss he could do nothing about when he arrived in January last year.

He was a victim of his own success on all fronts when Rangers let slip a league they would have won last season.

But if he's the man who presides over more than half of a four-in-a-row run by Celtic he'll go.

Then Murray knows he can't give Ally the job, passing on the baton of failure. He'd be tainted before he'd even set foot in the dugout under his own steam.