Rangers: Steven Gerrard did a great job but he’s not ready for Liverpool

Rangers: Steven Gerrard did a great job but he’s not ready for Liverpool

Steven Gerrard is still far from becoming a Liverpool coach – but I doubt he will be upset with it because he’s in the best position he can be as a manager at Rangers.

He’s done everything right so far and has good board support, which is all you want.

Everyone knows that in Rangers and Celtic, you have to win every week and they handle that pressure well.

Stephen is a hugely impressive person when you meet him and it should be cool to play with him. Some people said taking on the Rangers was a risk, but I think it was just a limited risk.

As a manager moving to a new club, he would have asked for certain confirmations and seem to have had good support from the club to bring in his players.

I can understand why some people in England look back at Steven’s time in Rangers and say he only has to defeat Celtic, who has been a shadow of their previous selves this season.

But I think with the results in Europe – reaching the Europa League Round of 16 in consecutive seasons – you also have to get people to sit back and notice.

I think Brendan Rodgers helped him too, as he came back after winning with Celtic and had a huge impact with Leicester.

As a manager, it’s all about the basics of how you engage with modern players – and your recruiting. You can see Stephen’s talent for it when you look at how he handled Alfredo Morelos.

The striker looked as though he wanted to leave Rangers and Stephen and the club handled him brilliantly and made him play well again.

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If you ask someone like Curtis Jones at Liverpool, he will say that Stephen had a huge influence on him while coaching the U-19 team. It gave him a lot of tough love.

“Liverpool’s management is a step forward”

There has always been a question of whether or not Stephen will manage Liverpool. Given Liverpool’s bad season, everyone is saying “Steven will be the next and Stephen will be the next” so the screams rose.

What I would like to say is that despite all the successes Rangers have achieved, the Liverpool management is in a different area. It would be a huge step. It would be a big gamble for the club’s owners – the Fenway Sports Group – to set him.

I think a one-eyed Liverpool fan would say ‘Get Stevie J’ if Jürgen Klopp left, but I think the others will take a step back and walk away: ‘He did an absolutely amazing job at Rangers, he was great. Player, but maybe he needs to take another job at Premier League first ‘.

I also don’t see Klopp go anywhere. He has been as close to Bill Shankly as he has been with the club, and he will not be losing his job anytime soon.

Stephen’s problem, then, is that other managers who go from their first job as a springboard to something bigger end up having the same success, so he has to be very careful.

He’s already contemplating winning the Premier League again next season and his shot in the Champions League with Rangers would be at the forefront of his thinking too.

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However, in the unlikely event Liverpool would contact them this summer, Stephen couldn’t say no. Because you will not be asked twice.

Mark Lawrenson was speaking to Scott Mullen from BBC Sport.

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Ayhan Fletcher

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