The only crumb of comfort Rangers supporters could take as they left the Groupama Arena was that this wretched European campaign will soon be over.
From humiliations in Brugge and Bergen to home humblings at the hands of Genk and Roma – and with more misery endured in between – it’s been a year to forget.
The fixtures against Ludogorets and Porto in January now feel like rude intrusions in the domestic season. They mean next to nothing in terms of the Europa League. The Ibrox side are out.
Any lingering hope Danny Rohl had of clinging on in this competition was smothered as his side failed to build on a promising start in Budapest.
They were deserving of the lead Bojan Miovski handed them, but were level at the interval when Bence Otvos scored deep into stoppage time.
Rohl needed his players to find something within themselves in the second period to keep their hopes flickering. In keeping with much of what we’ve witnessed this season, they were found wanting. Barnabas Varga’s header removed any lingering doubt about how this adventure would end.
Robbie Keane’s Ferencvaros are an impressive side with ambitions of going far in this tournament. Rangers had no right to believe they could take the Hungarian league leaders down in their own back yard.
Yet they have had a happy knack of beating teams of that ilk across the past seven seasons. Not this year, though. Not with this team.
Rohl has improved matters since taking over in late October but there are limits to what any head coach can do with a squad so evidently lacking in quality. Once again, they only played in patches.
The frustration from the German’s point of view is that, unlike that opening night in Norway, Rangers started the night looked like a football team. It was the manner in which they finished the game that will sting him for a few days to come.
Aside from an early scare which saw Bamidele Yusuf get in behind and fire tamely across goal, there was much for Rohl to admire about the way Rangers initially went about their business.
His side were structured. They played with personality and authority. They were inventive with the ball and funnelled behind it when they lost it. The Hungarian team were soon frustrated, while those in blue visibly grew in coincidence.
It might have been a different story had Toon Raemaekers found the target after Jack Butland dropped a routine cross, but the giant defender was the wrong man in the right place.
Ferencvaros had pace and power. Rangers negated those threats by doubling up and being organised. They dealt with set-pieces, which may have been their undoing a few weeks ago.
The opener came following an alarming moment of indecision between Nasser Djiga and Manny Fernandez which threatened to let Ferencvaros in.
Rohl’s men survived that scare, Connor Barron emerging with the ball and feeding Djeidi Gassama. He carried the ball over the halfway line and switched the play to Max Aarons. The wing-back’s cross from the right was struck goalward by Danilo but hit a defender.
Miovski acrobatically smashed the rebound home, only to whirl away and see the linesman’s flag raised. A VAR review deemed that Gabi Kanichowsky had, in fact, played him on.
Ferencvaros were too predictable in the first period. A succession of long hopeful balls were launched in the direction of Yusuf. By and large, the Rangers back-three — James Tavernier, Djiga and Fernandez — dealt with them efficiently.
On the next occasion when Yusuf popped up in behind, he fired harmlessly beyond the far post.
It was hard to see how the hosts would penetrate Rangers’ solid looking back-line. Five minutes into added on time at the end of the first half, they pieced together their first cohesive move to level.
A crisp exchange of passes ended with Ibrahim Cisse cleverly running over the ball and Alex Toth picking him out near the byline.
Cisse showed great awareness to look up and pick out Otvos. The midfielder calmly stroked the ball into the far corner via a slight deflection off Djiga. Butland was helpless.
It was a finely crafted goal, but Rohl would have to question why Jayden Meghoma didn’t knock an earlier cross out for a corner.
Rangers were still entitled to feel a little sore about being level at the break.
The fear for Rohl would have been that Keane would have torn strips off the home dressing room wall.
Within seconds of the restart, Ferencvaros smartly turned defence into attack. Varga looked set to clip the ball over the advancing Butland until Djiga made up the ground to execute a saving tackle.
Needing a win, Rohl introduced Mikey Moore and Dujon Sterling before the hour mark, the latter making his first appearance in eight months. Findlay Curtis and Youssef Chermiti were not long in joining them.
Ferencvaros improved after the break, but their second goal was still an atrocious concession from the visitors’ point of view. Overcommitted in search of the second goal they so badly needed, they vacated the right side of the park.
Callum O’Dowda did well to control the ball for the Hungarians and suddenly he was in a postcode of his own. His delivery caught Rangers’ defence flat-footed. Varga kept his eye on the ball and planted it beyond Butland. All that hard work wiped out in an instant.
Rangers were never coming back from that. In the flick of a switch, the elementary errors were back in their play and their composure was all gone.
Curtis came close to snatching a draw with a low shot which David Grof turned round the post. In the wider scheme of things, it mattered little.
Europe this year has been a chastening experience. Rohl will need no one to tell him he’s got a major job on hands to ensure it’s not the same case next season.
