Rangers will overcome away-day blues to break away from pack
Lack of wins on the road doesn’t point to soft centre when you look at the strength through the spine of the team
THE defeat to Livingston at the Toni Macaroni Arena on Sunday wasn’t what anyone at Rangers wanted, and the performance as a whole certainly fell below what manager Steven Gerrard would expect, as well as the standard that has been set so far this season.
And there is no doubt that it is a black mark on what has been a very impressive start to Gerrard’s managerial career at the club.
Despite that being the fourth league game Rangers have played away from home in the league and the fourth they have failed to win though, it isn’t a sign of a pattern or a cause for concern for me.
Things just simply didn’t go Rangers’ way on the day at a tough venue. The manager said after the game that his side could have played all day and not breached that Livi defence, and I would agree with that assessment.
But sometimes you have to give the opposition the credit for being so difficult to play against. Livingston are a team that is flying under Gary Holt and, while it was a slack goal to lose from a Rangers perspective on Sunday, it was really the misfiring forward line that didn’t perform on the day.
Given how well the attacking players have done so far this term, though,
you can allow them a rare off-day. Alfredo Morelos and Kyle Lafferty have been great, and the wide players have too, so I would chalk it up to a collective bad day at the office rather than a sign of anything deeper.
Rangers have been at some of the toughest venues in the league so far and when they have been beaten, as they also were at Celtic Park, there is no argument that they got what they merited on the day. However, they were unfortunate not to come away from Pittodrie and Fir Park with more than the point they did gain from each of those games after conceding last-gasp equalisers.
I can see why that might lead to some people saying that there is still a soft centre to this Rangers side,