RANGERS chairman Charles Green expects Elgin City’s directors to be in apologetic mood when they arrive at Ibrox for Sunday’s Scottish Cup tie.
Green is also urging Rangers’ supporters to forget last week’s ticketing fiasco and offer the same warm welcome to City fans this weekend as they did when the Moray club visited Glasgow in September.
Elgin were fined £25,000 this week and ordered to pay Rangers’ expenses after admitting they oversold more than a thousand tickets for last week’s Borough Briggs league clash between the teams.
The clubs will meet this Sunday in the 4th round of the Scottish Cup, with ‘Gers chair Green insisting his own club will be ‘reasonable’ to City’s visiting board members in spite of last week’s controversy by welcoming them to Ibrox.
"The directors of Elgin will have a big sense of responsibility and when they come here on Sunday I’m sure they’ll want to apologise first hand," Green told RangersTV.
"They have been here already this season and we made them welcome and I’m sure we will again.
"I can’t suggest for a second that the whole of the Elgin board are complicit in this incident and therefore we have to be reasonable."
A near capacity 46,000 crowd attended the last Rangers v Elgin City fixture in September, a Division 3 game which the Glasgow giants won 5-1.
Elgin chairman Graham Tatters and manager Ross Jack both praised the reception they were given that day by Rangers officials and supporters.
On Sunday, a lower crowd of under 30,000 is expected for the cup tie, and Green is keen for the match to pass over without any animosity being felt between the home faithful and a small band of travelling Elgin fans.
"What I would say to Rangers fans is that the Elgin fans are as innocent as the Rangers fans in this matter so they should get the usual Ibrox welcome we have extended to all of the Third Division clubs this year."
Green said Elgin would be counting the cost of their mistakes in ticketing arrangements.
"I think we all understand that when Rangers come to town it’s a money-spinner and they lost a lot of money at the weekend in terms of local businesses and corporate hospitality."
