But the arrival of Paul Le Guen has revived the feelgood factor amongst FFers everywhere and, despite some reservations about the new team needing more time to gel, there is absolutely no reason when we can't set the ball rolling with a victory over Motherwell.
Le New Gaffer has already made it clear that his starting eleven won't be too far removed from the side which lined up against Middlesbrough last weekend. Barry Ferguson and Chris Burke are injured, Krissie Boyd is suspended and there has been no last gasp swoop for any of the names the Press Gang seem to have picked out of a hat. But I saw enough last Saturday to keep me upbeat about our opening fixture.
Lionel Letizi looked sound between the sticks. His save from Rochemback's first half free kick was right out of the top drawer and I'm happy to go with a Svensson-Rodriguez partnership at the heart of the defence, with Hutton and Smith filling the full-back positions. Brahim Hemdani was in the holding role in front of the back four - the position he was signed to fill - and he will be a vital player for us, bringing the ball out from the back into the midfield area.
I was most impressed by Libor Sionko. In many ways he reminded me of Andre Kanchelskis, cutting in from the right (leaving space for Hutton to overlap into) to link up with Jeremy Clement. Unlike Kanchelskis, however, we've got Sionko and Clement at a good stage in their careers, they've still got to make names for themselves, and it would be good to see Charlie Adam rise to the new challenge he faces. Gavin Rae and Hamed Namouchi are also in contention for midfield berths so the manager doesn't lack options.
As Boyd is banned, Big Dado will be the main man up front, with the new-look, all-singing, all-dancing Thomas Buffel playing off his shoulder. At long last Buffy looks like becoming the player he promised to be for much of the past 18 months and I'm sure we'll get lots of goals from him this season. It would appear that Nacho will have to settle for a regular place on the bench and it will be very interesting to see how Makhtar N'Diaye shapes up.
Motherwell too will be well worth looking at. With Terry Butcher off to Australia - chased out of the country by those big, bad, bigoted bluenoses? Look out for the story appearing in the updated version of his autobiography! - Maurice Malpas has taken over and, although disappointed to lose to West Brom last weekend, they are sure to be up for it against Rangers. And no man will be more fired up than former Ranger Ross McCormack.
Arguably the best moment of last season came in Porto when super sub Ross fired home the late equaliser which effectively kept us in the Champions League. One moment we were down and out, the next we were back in the hunt and it was party time. Build My Gallows echoed all around as we made our way out of the ground, onto the subway and back into town where we sang loud and proud long into the night. We wouldn't have had nearly as much fun without Ross Mack's late strike so I'll always be grateful to him for that. Indeed, it was with more than passing disappointment that I learned he had been loaned out to Doncaster Rovers (just to keep his feet on the ground?) and was subsequently deemed surplus to requirements.
It wouldn't break my heart to see Ross grab a goal on Sunday, just so long as we do enough at the other end to render it meaningless. And why shouldn't we? We've got a top class coach moulding a new team, he has already shown that he knows what he wants and is determined to get it, so three points is hardly an over-ambitious target. But if we have to settle for less, we can console ourselves with the knowledge that, in each of the past four seasons, the eventual champions drew their opening fixture.
Maybe it is time to put an end to that irritatingly boring statistic. Over to you Monsieur Le Guen…