Angry mobs at the front gates, finger wagging and a considerable amount of effing and blinding?

It's just like 1983 all over again. At least then, though, Rangers were just rotten on the pitch, not festering financially like they have been over these last few devastating seasons. Compared to the current climate, '83 looks positively halcyon.

As they lurch from one crisis to the next, the latest threat of a fans' boycott of Ibrox has added a new layer of bewilderment to this baffling, on-going palaver.

It's 31 years since a fresh-faced Ally McCoist was lured back north to his boyhood heroes but he signed on during a largely fallow period for the club that would've made Old Mother Hubbard's cupboard look like a jam-packed pantry. Amid much teeth-gnashing by the Ibrox faithful, the young McCoist was well aware of the growing unrest as John Greig's managerial reign came creaking to an anguish-laden end.

The current incumbent of the hot seat remembers those years well and the lessons he learned are coming in quite handy. "There were some serious protests back in 1983, regarding the team and what was happening," said McCoist yesterday as he looked back to those downbeat days before the glory of the Graeme Souness era. "I remember it being a shock to the system. It was a shock to all the players. That said, you just have to handle it and get on with it because supporters have every right to voice their opinion in whatever way they feel regarding the team and the club. I was a fairly young player at the time but I remember we just tried to knuckle down and get better results. That's all we did.

"That hasn't really changed much. It is still the best philosophy for players because that is the greatest thing they can do for the club and supporters; produce results. In '83, the guys who helped me where people like big Colin McAdam, God rest him, and Gregor Stevens. We were toiling in that period. I always remember the first piece of advice I got from Gregor. He told me the one thing I'd need at this club was to be thick-skinned. If I was like that, I had a chance.

"To a certain degree, I think that still applies, whether you are a coach, manager, player or, indeed, supporter. It has been getting put to the test in terms of the supporters over the past couple of years."

Given the tumult that has been visited on this corner of Govan in recent seasons, McCoist's skin must now be as thick as a rhino's rear end that has been treated with Ronseal. "We're lucky that we have great pros," he added. "Boys who have been over the course and distance. They are obviously the likes of Lee McCulloch, Jon Daly and others who know what it is all about, and we have a younger element as well. But it is very important that we have a level-headed group of older professionals who do assist and have a great bearing on matters in the dressing room. That goes from there out on to the park as well."

With all the distractions, boardroom wrangles and the prospect of this month's wages not being paid on time, keeping the minds on football matters remains McCoist's chief focus.

"I have to congratulate them [the players] on concentrating on what could be seen as the most important job at the club: getting us out of this division," he said ahead of tonight's SPFL Championship match with Raith Rovers. "No-one has mentioned that [wages] at all, I promise you. No-one has mentioned any of the off-field stuff to me. They have been concentrated on getting the work done in training and so on. They have been great, really lively. I don't have anything to tell them in terms of off-field stuff. My priority is with the workforce and the club so if there was a need for me to tell them anything then I certainly would. I certainly haven't been passed any information that would concern me and make me think I had to say something to the boys."

The next thing he will be saying to his boys is a team talk for tonight's match in Kirkcaldy. The last time the two sides crossed swords was in April's Ramsdens Cup final and it was Raith Rovers who upset the odds with a 1-0 victory. "It was painful for a lot of the boys who hadn't experienced losing a massive game for Rangers," said McCoist, who revealed that Kenny Miller will undergo a scan on a calf injury he picked up in training. "I know they felt as bad as we all did. I don't like the word revenge in football, but that sour taste that was with us at Easter Road … I haven't forgotten, and it would be nice to get a result."