Attendance 57,183
Rangers crashed out of the League Cup tonight, going
down 0-2 to Celtic at Parkhead in a game where the
Holders got few breaks of the ball yet in truth were
comprehensively outplayed with goalkeeper Stefan Klos
(regarded by most as the club’s No. 1) badly at fault
for both goals.
There can be little doubt that one of the key moments
in the game was the ordering-off of Sotirios Kyrgiakos
in 65 minutes – a decision that appeared harsh in the
extreme, but this defeat means that Rangers have now
won just two out of their last eleven games.
Injury ravaged Rangers made two changes from Saturday
with Hamed Namouchi and Ian Murray replacing Brahim
Hemdani and Peter Lovenkrands.
There was the customary frenzied start with the Light
Blue legions taunting the home fans with such chants
as “You said you’d win the League – where’s the flag?”
and “There’s only one Scott McDonald” – but a Dado
Prso misplaced pass allowed Shaun Maloney to release
Aidan McGeady whose twenty-yard shot was held by Klos
in fourteen minutes.
Eleven minutes later McGeady’s cross-cum-shot from a
wide angle flashed just wide of the target.
The opener was merely delayed a further sixty seconds
however – Maloney taking possession of a Stilian
Petrov pass before rifling home a drive from all of
thirty yards – with Klos badly positioned.
Rangers did their utmost to respond – Namouchi’s
thirty-yard shot being inches wide in 33 minutes, then
sixty seconds later a surging run from Barry Ferguson
ended when Artur Boric held his twenty-yard shot.
The visitors were now making the running – Fernando
Ricksen seeing his eighteen-yard shot from a Prso pass
whistle just over in 35 minutes.
The first yellow card of the evening arrived in 38
minutes – and it was a wholly unjustified booking,
being for Kyrgiakos’ alleged foul on Petrov.
Significantly the incident happened right under the
nose of Assistant Referee Tom Murphy who clearly
signalled for a throw-in. Referee Kenny Clark however
thought otherwise.
Manager Alex McLeish replaced the ineffective Olivier
Bernard with the equally hapless Peter Lovenkrands at
the interval as ‘Eck’ searched for a miracle. Ten
minutes after the restart, Franny Jeffers replaced
Steven Thompson, but the former Everton and Arsenal
striker would prove to be equally invisible.
Rangers suffered a catastrophic blow in 65 minutes
when Kyrgiakos received a second yellow and subsequent
red for applauding the linesman following the award of
a foul against him. It was a preposterously harsh
decision by Referee Kenny Clark, but nevertheless the
Ibrox men were now right up against it.
Celtic went all out for the kill – McGeady seeing two
shots blocked in quick succession by Alan Hutton and
Julien Rodriguez from a Maloney pass six minutes
later.
John Hartson, in search of his 100th goal for Celtic,
should have sealed victory in 78 minutes when he
flicked a Shunsuke Nakamura cutback wide.
Immediately afterwards Rangers suffered yet another
injury blow when Rodriguez, arguably their best
player, limped off to be replaced by Pierre Fanfan.
Two minutes later Klos turned over a Nakamura
piledriver from Petrov’s pass, but from the resultant
corner the German was badly at fault when an
inswinging cross from the Jap saw him frozen to the
spot as both Bobo Balde and Fanfan stretched for the
ball, which incredibly broke off the back of the
goalkeeper’s knee into the net.
It was an appalling error by Klos, and one has to
question his refusal over the past three months to
play in Reserve fixtures. His lack of sharpness and
match practise has now been exposed, with his
unwillingness to play in such games surely amounting
to breach of contract.
Rangers did offer one last defiant gesture when a
Prso header from a Ferguson free-kick struck the
crossbar in 86 minutes, but time had run out on the
Cup Holders.
Afterwards besieged boss McLeish was still defiant
despite his abominable record this season:
“I’m disappointed. We’ll keep fighting as long as I’m
here. It’s not for me to decide on my future. We’ve
got to show fight, resilience and leadership. We never
showed the competitiveness that I would have liked. We
can’t afford not to get results.”
Quite what he meant by not getting results must be
beyond most – two wins in eleven games is simply not
good enough for a Rangers’ Manager, no matter the
circumstances.
And of those nine games that have failed to produce a
win, the Ibrox men have failed to score in six of
them. Far from Championship form, such a run belongs
at the other end of the table.
The time for action is long past – Livingston two
weeks ago was the time for David Murray to act, but he
MUST do so now, before Rangers fall headlong into the
bottom half of the League.
CELTIC Boruc; Telfer, Balde, McManus, Camara;
Nakamura, Petrov, Lennon, McGeady (Thompson 76);
Maloney, Hartson
UNUSED SUBS Marshall, Varga, Virgo, Pearson
RANGERS Klos; Hutton, Kyrgiakos, Rodriguez (Fanfan
78), Bernard (Lovenkrands 45); Ricksen, Namouchi,
Ferguson, Murray; Prso, Thompson (Jeffers 55)
UNUSED SUBS A. Rae, Waterreus
REFEREE Kenny Clark