The 2001–02 season was the 122nd season of competitive

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

by Rangers.

Overview

Rangers played a total of 59 competitive matches during the 2001–02 season. The side won both the

Scottish League Cup The Scottish League Cup, also known as the Premier Sports Cup for sponsorship reasons, is a football competition open to all Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) clubs. First held in 1946–47, it is the oldest national League cup in ...

and

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,Scottish Premier League The Scottish Premier League (SPL) was the Scottish football league system, top-level league competition for professional Association football, football clubs in Scotland. The league was founded in 1998, when it broke away from the Scottish Foo ...

. The season started under the Management of Dutchman

Dick Advocaat Dirk Nicolaas "Dick" Advocaat (; born 27 September 1947) is a Dutch former association football, football player and coach. He is currently the manager of the Curaçao national football team. Advocaat was successful as a football player and as a ...

. Inconsistent form including two losses to

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

meant that by December, Rangers were behind Celtic in the league. Advocaat announced his resignation in December, moving to the position of

Director of Football A sporting director, or director of sport, is an senior management, executive management position in a sports club. The role is well known as a manager role for European football clubs, which are sometime also "sports clubs", offering many typ ...

and Hibernian manager

Alex McLeish Alexander McLeish (born 21 January 1959) is a Scottish professional football manager and former player. He played as a defender for Aberdeen during their 1980s glory years, making nearly 500 League appearances for the club, and won 77 caps f ...

took over. Rangers league form improved under McLeish with only one defeat taking place under him before the end of the season, but the gap opened up by Celtic meant no challenge to win the league was possible. McLeish lead Rangers to success in the two domestic cup competitions. In the League Cup semi-final Rangers beat Celtic 2-1 after extra time with a long range Bert Konterman goal proving to be the winner. They would then go on to win the competition with a 4–0 win over Ayr United in the final. In the Scottish Cup Rangers against faced Celtic, this time in the final. A dramatic last minute goal from Peter Løvenkrands saw Rangers win the game 3–2. In Europe Rangers went out of the

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

third qualifying round to Fenerbache and therefore dropped into the

UEFA Cup The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star. Computer scientists and Mathematici ...

. Rangers progressed in this competition and a penalty shoot-out win over PSG saw them stay in Europe beyond Christmas for the first time in nine years. Rangers then narrowly lost the next round to eventual UEFA Cup winners

Feyenoord Feyenoord Rotterdam () is a Netherlands, Dutch professional association football, football club based in Rotterdam, which plays in the Eredivisie, the top tier in Dutch football league system, Dutch football. Founded as Wilhelmina in 1908, the ...

Overview

Players

Appearances

Transfers

In

Out

Results

Friendlies

Scottish Premier League

Scottish League Cup

Scottish Cup

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Cup

League table

References