McInnes proud as players bounce back

DEREK MCINNES was proud of his Aberdeen players as they recovered from their Hampden heartache to shock Rangers at Ibrox.

The Dons made their second trip of the week to Glasgow as they attempted to put their Betfred Cup final defeat to Celtic behind them.

And they did so in some style as Scott McKenna netted the only goal of the game to give them a famous victory over the Light Blues.

The Reds were reduced to 10 men in the first half as Sam Cosgrove saw red for two yellow-card offences.

But the visitors stood firm to see off a lacklustre Rangers and record a deserved win after a battling performance at Ibrox.

McInnes said: “We had to pick ourselves off the floor after Sunday but I was pleased with a lot of the aspects of the game.

“We’ve prided ourselves on our league form and, with a couple of games in hand, we wanted to see the importance of the points in December.

“The first three came at Ibrox and we got a lot of things right. It was similar to the game at Pittodrie – they went down to 10 men and had Morelos sent off but they had something to hold on to. Thankfully we managed to get an equaliser that day and thankfully Rangers didn’t last night.

“Rangers threw everything at us and I wasn’t surprised when I heard Lafferty was coming on at half-time. It gave us another problem to deal with.

“We’ve got four defenders available but they know their jobs. They defended brilliantly and there was tenacity all over the pitch. We got our just rewards.”