Rangers fan flames of crisis talk

GLENN GIBBONS AT IBROX

Rangers 2 Arveladze (20), Burke (51)
Hearts 1 Kirk (10)

RANGERS in recent times seem to have acquired a rare gift. It is a curious ability to produce football matches that leave both sets of supporters frustrated.

The process involves a largely unconvincing performance that ends with an acceptable result, but with their own followers uneasy over the future and their rivals dwelling ruefully on a cruel providence that has denied their team their due.

Visual evidence of the phenomenon is persuasive enough, but is supported by statistics which show that, in their past 17 games, Rangers have won by more than one goal on only three occasions. Two of those victories were achieved against opponents from the lower divisions, Forfar (6-0) and St Johnstone (3-0), in the CIS Cup.

The only wide-margin win in the Premierleague during that three-month run was secured at home to Aberdeen after the visitors had been reduced to ten men with the ordering-off of central defender Zander Diamond, the last two goals in the 3-0 scoreline coming in the closing minutes.

That period, of course, also includes the defeats by Celtic and Dunfermline and the draws with Livingston and Motherwell that have caused such damage to their prospects of retaining the championship, as well as the winless five-match sequence in the Champions League that eliminated them from Europe.

In this latest public airing of their difficulties, Rangers, it should be emphasised, demonstrated a little more spirit than of late, but it was a sporadic gesture, never sustained long enough to convince their supporters that they truly had the measure of a makeshift Hearts side who kept pace with them throughout the 90 minutes.

It was not difficult to sympathise with Craig Levein’s view that, for the Tynecastle side, the event represented a lost opportunity. If his players on occasion were just short of the deadliness and ruthlessness required to convert their chances, they could also reflect on the exceptional form of Stefan Klos, the Rangers goalkeeper confirming his status as the best in the country.

"I was very encouraged by the performance, because they didn’t give up, kept going right to the end," said Levein. "I feel for our players, because it was a great opportunity to get something from the game. But when you’re in control, as we were for much of the time, you really have to take your chances.

"It’s hard to get over the fact of what actually happened, to have left with nothing after performing as well as we have here for a long time."

‘It’s hard to leave with nothing after performing as well as we have here for a long time’- CRAIG LEVEIN

Levein had clearly regarded Rangers’ present vulnerability as an invitation to charge at them, to put their frailty to the test. His decision to play defender Kevin McKenna in attack - despite the absence of the suspended Andy Webster and the injured Steven Pressley - seemed to amount to a declaration of aggressive intent. But the tactic was, he revealed, based on intelligence gathered during Rangers’ defeat at East End Park the previous week-end.

"I had seen the goal Dunfermline scored last week, when Craig Brewster got the head flick on to Stevie Crawford, and I thought Kevin could give Andy Kirk similar service, that he could get the flicks and that we might get a similar break. If the ball had bounced right at times and we had taken our chances, we would certainly have got something."

It was when the score was at 1-1 in the first half that Hearts were at their most profligate. Robert Sloan was isolated when he received a low centre from McKenna on the right, but chose to shoot quickly - allowing Klos to make the block - when a moment’s deliberation would have given him the freedom to pick a spot in one of the corners.

Kirk seemed even more culpable when, with a free header at the back post from Sloan’s free kick on the right, he sent the ball wide. But the striker had already given Hearts their early lead with a miscue after a scramble following a corner, the ball screwing and bouncing over the line far to the right of Klos.

Rangers’ equaliser came from Arveladze’s header after Craig Gordon - the young Hearts goalkeeper, like his counterpart, also gave an excellent performance - had stopped Michael Mols’ close-range effort with his left foot, the ball spinning into the air and straight to the Georgian forward.

The winning goal came from the most fluent and incisive move of the match, a precise pass from Peter Lovenkrands through the inside left channel releasing Mols into space. The Dutchman’s driven, low cross eliminated all possibility of defence, leaving Chris Burke to knock the ball right-footed over the line from three yards.

Klos’s later save from McKenna’s header, the ball heading into the goalkeeper’s top right-hand corner, seemed to confirm that Hearts’ visit would be rendered pointless, although the German once again had to be alert to deny Sloan an equaliser in the last minute.

Whenever a manager in Alex McLeish’s position delivers a precis of a match that sounds as though he has been at a different event from the rest of us - he spoke of Rangers’ "high level of performance" - it should be remembered that he is bound by the politician’s obligation to prevaricate and "spin" in the cause of keeping up appearances.

There were, unarguably, more encouraging signs for McLeish in a performance that at least brought a halt to the successive defeats against Panathinaikos and Dunfermline. But not enough to put a stop to the head-shaking, dark mutterings and general anxiety of the home support.

Referee: H Dallas.

Attendance: 49,592

Taken from the Scotsman