Rangers capped off two days of utter humiliation for Scottish sides in Europe with a shocking 6-0 defeat to Club Brugge.
The result, which was 9-1 on aggregate, matches their worst ever in Europe, which was 12-4 against Eintracht Frankfurt in the European Cup semi-finals in the 1959/60 season.
Rangers lost 3-1 at home against their Belgian opponents in the first leg and were instantly in trouble in the return match with Max Aarons getting sent off in the eighth minute with his side 1-0 down.
Russell Martin’s side found themselves 5-0 down by half time, and Celtic legend Chris Sutton couldn’t resist a dig at his old rivals.
“Can’t see Rangers getting back into it now,” he joked on X.
Yet the former goalscorer didn’t exactly have much to boast about, with Celtic arguably doing worse a night earlier.
Brendan Rodgers‘ side were also competing in the final Champions League qualification play-off round when they suffered a shock exit to the virtually unknown FC Kairat.
The Kazakh side won narrowly on penalties, but given their status as UEFA’s 311th ranked club, it couldn’t have been much worse for Celtic who were huge favourites to progress against a team that have never played in the Champions League before.
Brugge, on the other hand, have played in Europe’s top tier competition in three of the past four seasons.
Either way, it was still a night of utter humiliation for Rangers who continued their horror start under former Southampton boss Martin.
The Glasgow side are winless in three in the Scottish Premiership having drawn their trio of opening games.
Adding the League Cup and Champions League qualification into the equation things don’t get much better either.
Overall it’s three wins, four draws and three defeats with 15 goals scored and 17 conceded.
Speaking to talkSPORT post-match, former Rangers midfielder Charlie Adam said: “It was an embarrassment and there has to be consequences.
“You can get beat but there’s a way of getting beat. You’ve got to have a bit of hunger and desire, but also pride in the football club.
“You’ve got to put your body on the line and grab somebody who’s not tracking back, there needs to be leadership in there because that could’ve been double figures.”
To make matters worse, Celtic are up next in the league on August 31, and could leave Russell on the brink with a win away at Ibrox.
For the league as a whole, this will be the first time since the 2021/22 season that there hasn’t been Scottish representation in the Champions League.
Back then the country was ranked ninth in UEFA’s coefficient, a joint-high since the governing body implemented the measure for qualification spots.
However, tonight’s result drops them to 17th, below Switzerland, while falling another spot would reduce their number of teams who qualify for European competition from five to four.