ROCKETING TO THE FINISH LINE
Gerrard’s rant at Fir Park just a bump in road as Rangers put foot down on County
NO accusations of walking football needed from the manager this time. No requirement for the kind of half-time rocket that had the dressing-room walls at Fir Park reverberating.
This was the ruthless, relentless Rangers that manager Steven Gerrard has been demanding for weeks. Right on top of the game from the off, turning dominance into an early goal and keeping the boot down to drive the old Light Blue juggernaut over the opposition, squishing them into the turf.
To think, Ross County arrived at Ibrox in bullish form. Fresh from a 4-1 hammering of Aberdeen at home, there were suspicions John Hughes’ side could maybe make a game of this should the Rangers team that took their eye off the ball at Pittodrie or failed to get started at Motherwell pitch up again.
How naive that seems now. It took just six minutes for Rangers to get themselves in front thanks to a delicate finish to a delightful move from Ryan Kent, a guy who encapsulates the team’s wider objective of recovering their killer instinct on a more consistent basis.
By half-time, they were three to the good thanks to the recalled Filip Helander and Joe Aribo. James Tavernier had also missed another penalty and Kent had hit the post. It could have been six or seven at the interval, truth be told.
By the end, it was five. And the visitors got off lightly at that. Ryan Jack, making a first substitute appearance on his return from a knee injury picked up in November, got on the scoresheet midway through the second 45 and Connor Goldson tied it up at the end.
On a day of many positives for Gerrard in his 150th outing as Rangers boss, Kemar Roofe also returned to the bench after injury. The former England and Liverpool captain was also able to make five substitutions midway through the second half and let some of his more important contributors take the weight off the slingbacks for a bit.
He is entering the final straight with useful reinforcements and a range of options that will be handy for a Europa League last-32 clash with Royal Antwerp next month.
Now 23 points clear of Celtic having played three games more, nine more wins from 13 remaining league fixtures will wrap up the title in red, white and blue. Play like they did here — their 12th straight victory at Ibrox — and the signs are it will be over in jig time.
What seemed to annoy Gerrard most about last weekend’s visit to Motherwell was the passive nature of Rangers’ first-half display. When there is a title race to be closed out, particularly with a collection of players likely to face questions until they have got over the line to win their first major trophy, there really is no time for wishy-washy tiki-taka.
Rangers went for the throat in this one, though. And they got almost immediate reward.
The opener was such a pretty little affair, aided and abetted by some questionable defending from a Ross County rearguard that offered little resistance.
Ianis Hagi played the ball out wide to Tavernier and his cross picked out Alfredo Morelos at the back post. Morelos is hardly a towering presence in attack, but he still managed to get between Callum Morris and Ross Draper to cushion a lovely little header back to Kent.
What happened next was coolness personified. Kent nodded the ball over keeper Ross Laidlaw with no lack of finesse and started the celebrations before it had looped under the crossbar and into the net.
Faced with this Rangers team in a focused, spiteful frame of mind, opposition defences really need to be on-point. However, the Staggies, with Celtic loan signing Leo Hjelde being thrown into a torrid debut, kept making elementary errors in difficult positions.
On 13 minutes, their slackness saw them concede a penalty. It started with Morris giving the ball away. Even when possession had been regained and Alex Iacovitti had the ball at his feet outside his own area, there was more silliness to come.
Iacovitti seemed to suffer some kind of brain freeze in the chilly conditions and got caught with the ball under his feet by Morelos. The little Colombian nipped into the box with the ball and was duly brought crashing by the backtracking centre-half, who picked up a yellow card for the offence.
Tavernier stepped up to take the spot-kick and struck the ball well enough, but Laidlaw got down low to his right to save. That’s two penalties missed in three games by the Ibrox captain following his slip-up at Aberdeen earlier in the month, but the league has become such a procession that we are at the point where it doesn’t really matter.
It certainly didn’t here. Kent smacked the base of Laidlaw’s left-hand post with a low drive within three minutes of Tavernier’s mis-step and, just before the half hour, Helander made it two.
Borna Barisic delivered a searching corner from the left, Iacovitti lost Helander, ending up on the deck, and the Swede found himself in perfect isolation inside the area to bullet home a header.
The County defender stayed on the ground for a while before getting up with the grace and fluidity of an octogenarian. The likelihood is, though, that it was his pride bruised much more than his body.
Number three arrived in good time before the break and what a piece of art it was from Aribo. He collected the ball so far out on the right that he was almost at the corner flag.
No matter, he cut inside past Charlie Lakin and then Connor Randall before releasing an exocet missile from an acute angle into the far corner.
Hagi flashed an effort over just before being denied by an excellent late block from Morris, and Morelos then tested Laidlaw after the break before County finally came close on 53 minutes.
Morris beat the offside trap with a nicely-timed run to get on the end of an Iain Vigurs free-kick and was a little unlucky to see his header come off the top of the crossbar. Before long, though, and with four of his five subs on the park to let some of his more important players rest up, came Jack’s return to the fray. What a lovely goal he scored, too.
Only on the field for five minutes after replacing Steven Davis, he kicked off the move by playing the ball to fellow substitute Cedric Itten. From there, it worked its way through Hagi and made its way back to Jack inside the area, his low finish squeezing inside the near post.
Goldson then made it 5-0 nine minutes from time with a header from a Barisic corner.
Yep, the ‘walking football’ that attracted Gerrard’s ire at Aberdeen is now consigned to history. Rangers are back strolling it towards the title.