I reckon Ladbrokes would just about have let you name your price and, with Advocaat having subsequently been all around the houses, taking South Korea to the last World Cup and Holland to Euro2004, while Walter returned to Rangers in the wake of the PLG disaster, I'm sure those odds would have lengthened considerably.
Ten years ago Walter was bad-mouthed as the tactical buffoon who had blown ten-in-a-row while Dick was greeted like the new messiah. However, with the passing of time, recognition that much of the Dutchman's shopping pushed our club towards financial meltdown and growing respect for what Walter had achieved, rather than disdain for his failures, has generated a more healthy debate about who was the better manager.
Initially, we all bought into what the Caat Man had to offer. Taking over in the summer of 1998, he inherited more than an empty trophy-room. So many of the dressing-room's legendary figures had moved on so he had to bring in his own men and Arthur Numan, Gio Van B, Rod Wallace, Gabby Amato and the Great Charbo quickly became big favourites. Winning the Treble in his first full season confirmed that he was the real deal and we looked to him to deliver what Walter had failed to do, namely European respectabilty.
Well, being 3-0 down to Shelbourne early in the second half of his first UEFA Cup tie just weeks after he had taken over gave us all a wee fright but we recovered and went on to see off useful outfits like PAOK Salonika and Bayer Leverkusen before losing out unluckily to Parma. The real test would come the following year when we returned to the Champions League and we couldn't have made a better start than avenging that defeat from Parma, who had gone on to win the UEFA Cup, in the qualifying round. By now Mikey Mols had joined and we really looked forward to making our presence felt on the big stage, being grouped alongside Valencia, Bayern Munich and Advocaat's former club PSV.
Defeat in Valencia gave us an early wake-up call, an injury time gift of a free-kick enabled Bayern to escape from Ibrox with a 1-1 draw but home and away victories over PSV - the 4-1 win over them remains one of the great Ibrox European nights! - had us believing we could progress in the competition. Even after losing 2-1 to Valencia at Ibrox, we were still on course to qualify with a draw in Munich but we went down 1-0 to an iffy penalty and, more significantly, lost Mikey Mols when that big ape Oliver Khan clattered into him on the feckin halfway line. The big bassa should have been jailed, never mind red carded, but like Schumacher before him, the German keeper got away with a blatant act of thuggery.
The loss of Mols was a massive blow and, although the Gers enjoyed another successful season which culminated in the Orange Cup Final of 2000, I can't help thinking so much more could have been achieved, especially in Europe, if he had stayed injury free. The arrival of RbB, Bertie Bombscare and Fernando added to the huge Dutch contingent in the squad and, with Martian O'Kneel reviving Ra Sellick, the first whispers of a split in the dressing room began to be heard.
The Caat Man never lacked faith in his ability to create a winning side but sometimes a little more humility would have served him better. The 6-2 gubbing we got at the Piggery in August 2000 was clearly avoidable and not just because the Scum Of got every break going from yet another compliant referee. When it started going wrong, the team should have closed ranks to take the sting out of Celtc's attacks, then clawed themselves back into the game- the way Walter had done in his first spell in charge and continues to do today - but just as he did when we lost an early goal and were quickly down to ten men in the 5-1 game at the same place in his first year in charge, Advocaat played an open game and we suffered for it.
But he certainly knows his stuff. His second crack at the Champions league saw us get off to a flyer, thrashing Sturm Graz 5-0, then winning 1-0 in Monaco when he pulled off the master stroke of playing Tugay as sweeper. But in a remarkable similarity to this season's campaign, our early advantage was surrendered with a 3-2 defeat and 0-0 draw with Galatasaray, we then lost 2-0 to the same Sturm Graz side we had humped just a few weeks earlier and left ourselves needing to beat Monaco in our final game to qualify. Although twice ahead, we had to settle for a 2-2 draw and a place in the UEFA Cup but, just like the previous season when lost to Borussia Dortmund, Kaiserslautern dumped us out of Europe before Christmas. For all the cash he had spent and the big names he had brought to Ibrox, the Caat Man was no more successful in Europe than his predecessor.
If tactical know-how has been Advocaat's main attribute, his lack of man-management skills remains his achilles heel. Walter on the other hand, perhaps less gifted in terms of a dramatic ability to change the course of a game, knows how to get the best out of his players. Indeed, as we look at the current Rangers squad, it is clearly a very together unit, rather than a flambouyant fast flowing team. But classy opponents like Lyon, Barca, Werder Bremen, Sporting and Fiorentina would all claim to be better than us, yet they have all had trouble breaking Rangers down.
This is the problem Tricky Dicky will face when we meet at Manchester on May 14. Some of their results have caught the eye, none more so than their 4-0 drubbing of Bayern Munich, Oliver Khan and all, while we were in Florence but they will be facing a rock-solid defence which has kept no fewer than 12 clean sheets in 18 European ties this season. And I fancy us to put up the shutters again in the UEFA Cup Final.
I'm not sure how Walter and Dick get on together. Both men initially left Ibrox under a cloud and will surely feel they have something of a personal axe to grind. Advocaat's end came midway through the 2001-02 season and I wonder if he feels the Minted One hung him out to dry, signing the cheques but then blaming the manager for getting us into the hole. And Walter must have looked on jealously as his successor was given a transfer budget well beyond anything made available to him.
Both men are top quality managers but different in every way. Advocaat is a football mercenary, a guy who regularly moves from job to job in search of a better deal and, although Walter has had a few employers throughout his career, he is essentially a Rangers man, a guy who puts body and soul into his work while his Manchester rival, perhaps no less committed to the job at hand, could walk away at any time and take his talents elsewhere.
During the recent 'Boo Boys Could Drive Me Away' garbage in the papers, Walter was quick to put the record straight when he said 'I haven't come back to this job to walk away from it'. Therein lies the difference between him and Dick. At the first sign of a serious challenge, the Dutchman got stroppy and, ultimately, he was happy to be on his way.
I certainly know which one I prefer as manager of the Rangers and I've no doubt he will be the man celebrating on Wednesday night.
SHERBET DAB