Ibrox’s latest screw-up should fill everyone at the club with deep embarrassment.

Last night, amidst much media euphoria, the Ibrox club scraped past a very poor Malmö team in the Europa League. They were virtually handed a goal by a home side that barely broke into a sweat, much to the fury of their own manager.

I touched on this earlier today, noting how tired the Ibrox players looked as the game wore on, particularly the striker Cyriel Dessers, who was almost out on his feet by the time the final whistle blew. The reason Dessers was so exhausted? They didn’t have a backup striker on the bench. And the reason for that is downright bizarre.

We’ve had a good laugh on this blog about how the media is hyping up Igmane as the next big thing, not just for the Ibrox club but in European football. Apparently, he’s going to be a sensation, play for top clubs, and secure them an eight-figure transfer fee. We’ve all heard that kind of hyperbole before, none of it grounded in reality.

This “phenomenon” was so crucial that they left him out of the starting lineup for last weekend’s cup tie against Dundee. Last night, he wasn’t even in the squad. Naturally, I wondered what had happened, and then it emerged, via an Ibrox fan site, that there had been a passport issue. Yes, a passport issue. This meant that he couldn’t even get on the plane, leaving them with just one fit striker for a match they needed to win.

In the post-match interviews, the manager spoke to the media. Amongst all the backslapping, someone asked about Igmane. He expressed his frustration but didn’t elaborate – though, by all accounts, elaboration was exactly what was needed.

Interestingly, it was a fan site this morning that dug into the details. As a Moroccan national, Igmane is apparently required to give 16 days’ notice before travelling within the European Common Travel Area on his current passport. That’s the explanation being offered for why he couldn’t play. Presumably, they didn’t file the paperwork in time.

Now, they’ve known about this fixture for 26 days, more than enough time to sort out any travel issues. Among the other excuses being floated are that he didn’t have enough pages in his passport or that processing took too long. Frankly, it all sounds like rubbish – the club trying to cover for yet another monumental internal blunder.

Are they really suggesting that the Home Office wouldn’t have expedited things if necessary? Of course they would. If it was something as simple as not having enough pages in his passport or it expiring soon, that could easily have been dealt with in 26 days. Any competent organisation would have reached out to the right people to ensure their player could travel. This isn’t a unique situation – clubs all over the world handle these logistics week in, week out.

It’s not just the 26 days, either. Igmane has been at the club for months. If there were any problems with his passport or visa, they should have been flagged and dealt with long before now. Whatever excuse the club is offering, that’s all it is – an excuse. This is a colossal screw-up, no matter how much they try to disguise it.

But, as always, the Ibrox club finds new ways to demonstrate its breathtaking incompetence. Only the SFA – who managed to lose a senior member of staff today just two months after hiring him – could make them look like a professional outfit by comparison.

Sorting out a visa with nearly a month’s notice is basic stuff, ABC for a well-run organisation, especially a football club with the resources at its disposal. Ensuring your players can board a plane is as fundamental as it gets.

Think about how incompetent and dysfunctional an organisation must be to make a mistake on that level. And think about how clueless they must be to fail at something so basic.

Then remember, this is the same club that couldn’t even play at their own ground for the first two months of the season. I guess James Bisgrove will be relieved he can’t be blamed for this one – though I’m sure Keith Jackson will try.

If they had struggled last night, or if Dessers had suffered an injury, serious questions would be asked today. And rightly so. Nobody would accept such a feeble explanation without acknowledging that someone at the club had dropped the ball. It’s obvious the manager isn’t best pleased, and he’s right not to be.

But look at the laudatory headlines this morning, talking about corners being turned and the club being back on track. Now imagine if this was us. Imagine if Celtic had made such a basic error. The reaction would be volcanic. The media would be screaming from the rooftops, demanding to know how someone in the upper echelons had hampered the manager’s chances to get a result. It would be a firestorm, and we’d be getting exactly what we deserved.

Yet they are not. You don’t even have to wonder why, because we already know. The media is filled to the rafters with these Peepul, and the Peepul would rather not know inconvenient facts, preferring, as ever, the comforting fictions. Hell mend them.

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