Also, "The" was used for particularly sneaky reasons - some fans referred to "the rangers" in conversation pre-2012, just because of their own particular way of speaking. So Green was able to jump on the back of that. But more sneaky imo was using a prefix that would actually get in the way during general conversation - he knew fine well that people would soon want to stop that and just use the word "Rangers" simply to benefit the flow of the conversation. As I said, sneaky and lacking any dignity.
In fact I recall Cowan and Cosgrove on radio Scotland a couple of years ago agreeing that they should stop trying to say "The Rangers" simply because it kept tripping up their conversations.
So there you go - the only reason that (the new) Rangers get treated the same as the old Rangers is for the sake of conversation