Rangers leave it late at Tannadice

Dundee United 1 (Dodds 82) Rangers 3 (Capucho 13,
Arveladze 85, Arteta 89 Pen)

Attendance 11,111

Rangers went back to the summit of the League
Championship race with a 3-1 win over Dundee United at
Tannadice this afternoon, three of the four goals
coming during a hectic closing eight minutes.

It was a game that the Scottish Champions should have
had sewn up long before half-time, yet came perilously
close to throwing away thanks to some shoddy
finishing.

Rangers made three changes from the starting line-up
in Copenhagen with Bob Malcolm, Paulo Vanoli and Nuno
Capucho replacing the injured Henning Berg and Michael
Ball and the departed Barry Ferguson. New signing
Emerson was on the bench, but there was no place for
the other recent arrival Egil Ostenstad. Stefan Klos
led out the team as Captain. Dundee United, the only
SPL side remaining pointless after yesterday's
results, fielded a side with three former Rangers'
players, namely Derek McInnes, Charlie Miller and
Barry Robson, and containing no fewer than seven new
signings from last season.

The game kicked off with huge gaps amongst the home
support, and the game took some time to come to life.

Rangers first threatened in twelve minutes when Shota
Arveladze released Ronald De Boer wide on the left,
only for goalkeeper Tony Bullock to come to the home
side's rescue by blocking his effort. De Boer was
first to the rebound, squaring for Arveladze whose
chip hit the top of the crossbar.

The opening goal was delayed a mere sixty seconds
however - and it was Nuno Capucho who struck for his
first competitive goal for the club, turning home a
Michael Mols cutback from a De Boer cross.

It was all Rangers - and twice within the space of
three minutes Mols should have made it two, firstly in
nineteen minutes when he headed a Mikel Arteta cross
wide, then three minutes on he should have done better
than allow Bullock to block his effort when released
through the middle by the Spaniard.

Arteta himself almost produced the goods on the
half-hour when he worked an opening before seeing his
left-foot drive held by Bullock.

The one-way traffic continued unabated - and Capucho
almost doubled his own personal tally when his header
from a long Malcolm pass only just missed the target,
and the half ended with the visitors in total command
but with just the single goal lead.

Six minutes after the restart the limping De Boer was
replaced by former Tannadice star Steven Thompson, the
old boy receiving a predictably hostile reception from
the home support.

Rangers continued to dominate - sixty seconds later
Arveladze took possession of an Arteta pass and beat
two defenders before firing just over.

United began to realise that, no matter how much they
had been outplayed, there was only one goal in it, and
twice within a couple of minutes on the hour they
tested Stefan Klos with Charlie Miller the danger man
on both occasions. In the first instance a Colin
Samuel knock-down saw the former Ibrox man's volley
turned wide by Klos, then Miller almost took advantage
of a slack Arveladze pass but was again thwarted by
the Rangers' goalkeeper.

The course of the game however had taken a sudden and unexpected turn as the visitors appeared to have lost their way somewhat.

To the delight of the Light Blue legions Emerson was
introduced to the fray in 64 minutes, replacing
Capucho, thus becoming the first Brazilian to play for
Rangers, but despite the obvious class and skill of
the former Atletico Madrid player it was an 81st
minute substitution by the home side that almost
turned the tide when one former Ranger (Billy Dodds)
replaced another (Oleg).

With his first touch of the ball Dodds incredibly
headed home a cross from another substitute Jason
Scotland, and suddenly Rangers were in grave danger of
throwing away a game they should have had won many
times over with United in touching distance of their
first point of the season. It was the second
successive game against his old club that Dodds had
found the net.

The scores were level for only three minutes however -
and for the second time in five days it was a
spectacular Arveladze strike that meant so much to
Rangers, Shota taking a Thompson header from an
Emerson cross on his chest before swivelling in
mid-air to volley home a stunning goal.

The Tannadice men were not finished by any means -
Klos having to be alert to hold Jim McIntyre's 88th
minute flying header from Danny Griffin's cross.

The points were sealed however in the final minute
when Arteta converted a penalty after Mols was upended
by Chris Innes.

The final scoreline of 3-1 at least did go some way to
reflecting Rangers' superiority.

Manager Alex McLeish afterwards reflected:

"It's been a hard week mentally and physically. We had
a brilliant first-half but might have thrown it away.
We allowed Dundee United back in to the game. We will
need our strongest team to compete in all
competitions."

His opposite number Ian McCall was typically bullish:

"We can take a lot of positives from the game. Rangers
murdered us in the opening 30 minutes, but we gave
them a going over in the second-half."

DUNDEE UNITED Bullock; Griffin, Archibald, Innes,
Duff; Kerr (Paterson 86), McInnes, Miller, Robson
(Dodds 81); Samuel (Scotland 71), McIntyre
UNUSED SUBS Gallacher, McCracken

RANGERS Klos; Ricksen, Malcolm, Khizanishvili, Vanoli;
Capucho (Emerson 64), Arteta, Nerlinger, Arveladze;
Mols, De Boer (Thompson 51)
UNUSED SUBS McGregor, Ross, Hughes

REFEREE John Underhill