New Champions League record: Glasgow Rangers are the worst team in history

Where there are winners, there must be losers.

New Champions League record: Glasgow Rangers are the worst team in history

Where there are winners, there must be losers. That is the immutable law of sport. Some losers later lament the injustices they suffered on the way to defeat. Others have no excuses, but at least achieve dubious records. Just like the Glasgow Rangers.

For last year's Europa League finalists, the task was as clear as it was complicated. Five games, five defeats were recorded in the Champions League season. The opponents from Liverpool, Naples and Amsterdam have simply been too strong so far. But despite only scoring one goal and conceding 19 goals, there was still hope. If they win by five goals, they could mark the game against Ajax Amsterdam as a great success. They would then no longer be able to play the Champions League in 2023, but they would still be able to play the Europa League.

Failure to do so would mean extinction after the group stage and, to make matters worse, the Scots faced a historic debacle: the worst result of any club in the 30-year history of the Champions League. This required a defeat by two or more goals.

Rangers opted early for the historic debacle. The Scots were on course after just 29 minutes. The Ajax stars Steven Berghuis and Mohammed Kudus didn't need to be asked twice and started the debacle with their goals. At half strength, Rangers braced themselves for the rest of the game and celebrated extensively when captain James Tavernier was able to reduce the deficit to 2-1 with a penalty just before the end. But soon Ibrox fell silent again. Teenager Francisco Conceicao, who had just been substituted on by Ajax coach Alfred Schreuder, scored his first goal in the Champions League in the 89th minute, putting his opponents in the history books.

Because that had actually never happened before. Six losses in six games and 2:22 goals. A goal difference of minus 20 and thus officially the worst team in Champions League history. One goal worse than Dinamo Zagreb, who lost six and scored 3:22 in a group with Real Madrid, Olympique Lyon and also Ajax in 2011/2012.

"Simply the worst," headlined the "Scottish Sun" after the historic bankruptcy. "We were punished. We have to learn from it," said captain Tavernier. "We didn't do ourselves justice. We didn't give the fans what they wanted." He was probably right about that. Because now the proud Rangers supporters are carrying the burden of a historic record with them. The record of horror: 1: 3 and 0: 4 against Ajax Amsterdam, twice 0: 3 against SSC Napoli and 0: 2 and 1: 7 against Liverpool. Not only the fans would have liked to spare themselves that.