Miller breaks Hearts on sizzling return to side after Pedro purgatory
HEARTS 1 Lafferty (24) RANGERS 3 Miller (42), (67), Windass (72)
Kenny Miller spoke briefly after his game but to be fair he didn’t have to: his goals had already done his talking for him.
Shunned since the Celtic game by Pedro Caixinha and banished from Ibrox completely for Wednesday’s draw with Kilmarnock which led to the departure of the Portuguese, the 37-year-old returned to the fold here with glorious results.
He scored twice and provided an assist for Josh Windass to set his team up for a comfortable victory in their first outing under Graeme Murty’s second spell in interim charge of the team.
The embrace he shared with the man who had not only brought him back in but also made him skipper as he left the pitch late on to thunderous applause offered up a picture worth a thousand words.
“It’s great to be back involved,” said Miller.
“It’s been a tough month to be honest but I just tried to stay strong through it and go into work every day and be the best you can be and help the team-mates as much as you can.
“I just tried to stay as professional as I can.
“I was staying strong and enjoyed coming into work every single day. That never changed. It was just disappointing not to get a game at the end of the week.
“I always had the belief that I would be back in a Rangers jersey so I’m delighted with the result today. It’s good to get three points off the back of a couple of disappointing results.
“That dressing room is unified. It has a lot of good people in there and good players as well, we have maybe just not being showing it over the last couple of performances.”
As Hearts manager Craig Levein argued, for a long time it looked like things would end very differently.
His team grabbed the opening goal, an absolute stunner from Kyle Lafferty, a man Rangers once shelled out £3m on.
That was nine years ago and his form in a maroon jersey this season has not inspired too much confidence from followers of Hearts.
So much so in fact that, when Ross McCrorie presented him with a set-piece opportunity 25 yards out when fouling Esmael Goncalves, one was heard to mutter he would have more chance of success if he was trying to convert a rugby penalty.
The lack of optimism was to prove unjustified, however.
The Northern Ireland international weighed up his angles carefully then stepped forward and curled a shot into the top corner to leave the diving Wes Foderingham clasping at air.
It set things up perfectly with Rangers forced to push on to the front foot.
The visitors got their reward too with an equaliser which had looked scripted from the moment the teamlines were announced featuring Miller front and centre of the visitors attack.
All that remained was for the veteran to repay his manager’s faith.
And when Alfredo Morelos held off Christophe Berra to squeeze a pass through the middle in behind for him to run onto, that was exactly what he did.
Head down, he snapped off a shot which his marker John Souttar got a touch to at full stretch but only succeeded in looping the ball over his own goalie Jon McLaughlin and into the goal.
The contest ebbed and flowed after that, most eye-catchingly two of Hearts’ precocious stars Harry Cochrane, 16, and Lewis Moore, 19, showed ambition when trying their luck in front of goal.
Both were to be substituted off, though, after Miller’s second big contribution – this time a header score off James Tavernier’s cross – put Rangers ahead for the first time in the game.
Things were to get even worse too for Hearts, who in fairness had been handicapped by the loss of Jamie Walker to a pulled hamstring.
They went two behind when conceding a goal which from their perspective was bad enough as to be described as borderline ugly.
Rafal Grzelak wasn’t strong enough when allowing Josh Windass to glide inside unchallenged, keeper McLaughlin shouldn’t really have been beaten by the winger’s effort at his near post.
The latter McLaughlin redeemed himself to an extent when pulling off a nice stop to deny Morelos what would have been a fourth.
And that, pretty much, was that.