Russell Martin on brink of Rangers unwanted history after Hearts loss

Unwanted record 

Rangers manager Russell Martin is facing the ignominy of making unwanted history if he is sacked after overseeing another shock defeat on Saturday. The 39-year-old could only watch on in despair as his side lost 2-0 at home to Hearts at Ibrox, leaving Rangers in 10th place in the Scottish Premiership. The Gers are still without a league win under Martin's management, having played five games and drawn four. His reign has only just passed the 100-day mark since he was appointed on June 5, but time already appears to be against the ex-Scotland international in terms of steering the ship away from rocky waters in Glasgow.

If he was to be sacked in the coming days or even weeks, Martin's reign would be shortest of any permanently-appointed manager in the club's history. His current reign of 101 days (as of September 13) is some way short of Paul Le Guen's 186-day stint in the dugout. Following their disappointing defeat on Saturday, Martin's points-per-game record with Rangers has fallen to the third-lowest average tally in the club's history, collecting only 1.27 points on average from his 11 matches in charge. That puts him behind his predecessor Barry Ferguson on 1.5 PPG, with only caretaker manager Kenny McDowall - their interim boss from December 2013 to March 2014 - achieving a lower PPG this century on 1.2.

Calls for Martin to be sacked have strengthened after Rangers were knocked out of the Europa League qualifying rounds by Club Brugge, losing 3-1 at home before a heavy 6-0 defeat in Belgium prompted angry chants from Rangers fans towards the former Southampton manager. Following their most recent defeat against Hearts, the Scottish giants may decide to take action as things took an ugly turn. Former Rangers striker Kris Boyd, working as a reporter for Sky Sports, claimed their supporters joined chants encouraging the club to sack Martin. Boyd, who described Rangers' performance as 'terrible', said: "One team looked organised defensively and in-sync going forward, and that was Hearts. Rangers, at home, failed to lay a glove on Hearts." He later added: "I don't see any way back from this for Russell Martin. You can cut some new managers some slack if you can see slight improvement game to game, but it's actually going the other way."

After the game on Saturday, Martin faced a grilling in his post-match press conference. Addressing the supporters' dissatisfaction, Russell responded: "They're entitled to their opinion. They're entitled to their opinion, so I can't come out here and criticise that. The fans are always entitled to their opinion. I don't think many of them wanted me here in the first place." Russell also conceded he had no idea if the Rangers hierarchy would give him the dreaded vote of confidence and refused to resign: "I don't know [what the board will do]. We'll see, won't we? They've been great up until now. All of them. So we'll see," he added, before insisting that he had not been instructed to meet with the board to discuss his future.