PORT IN A STORM

Gerrard fumes at Ryan’s red card challenge as Gers fight back

STEVEN GERRARD last night reignited his long-running feud with Ryan Porteous after labelling the Hibs defender’s wild lunge on Joe Aribo yesterday a leg breaker.

The Rangers boss has bad blood with the young stopper, refusing to shake his hand last season after a red card for a shocker on Borna Barisic.

Porteous was sent packing again at Ibrox when he walked for an eye-watering tackle on midfielder Aribo (right) when his side were 1-0 up against the champions thanks to Kevin Nisbet’s header.

Rangers celebrated as sub Kemar Roofe and Alfredo Morelos bagged the goals to send them top of the table by a point.

But Gerrard insisted Porteous deserved to go and hit out at the 22-year-old defender for failing to learn from his previous misdemeanours.

He said: “I know one or two things about bad tackles because I have made a few myself, so I am not in a glass house here.

“It’s a wild tackle. It’s a leg-breaking tackle if he catches him.

“The kid only has to play the ball. I don’t know why there is any reason that he wants to go in with that intent.

“It is the second time he has done it against us because he done it against

Lassana Coulibaly not so long ago. So the kid is obviously not learning and he has let his manager and his team-mates down today.

“There is no defending a tackle like that because the speed of it, the height of it and the force doesn’t belong on a football pitch.

“I had to learn over the years myself, as a player, from those types of moments of madness, so hopefully the kid learns.”

Gerrard celebrated on the pitch after the hard fought three points as he knew it was a major result.

He said: “Credit to Hibs, they were a real tough nut to crack and they are a good team.

“It was a lot closer to where we want it to be at times w e played some really good stuff.

“Their goal came against the run of play, I thought we had control at that stage. But to be fair to Hibs, it is a fantastic cross and it is a good header.

“That makes the task a lot harder, it complicates it a bit. But I have got to pay my players a lot of credit because we didn’t panic, we kept doing the right things, we kept asking questions and were rewarded for all our good play in the end.”

Rangers had 74% possession but had to work hard to find the breakthrough 15 minutes into the second half.

Hibs withstood increasing pressure from Rangers until substitute Roofe levelled with a header. Colombia striker Morelos then nodded a dramatic winner for the hosts with 11 minutes left to take the champions one point clear of Hearts at the top of the cinch Premiership. Gerrard said: “At times I have asked for more in that department. When we actually get to the final third, I have asked for more variety and more creativity.

“We worked the keeper a lot more in the second half. Obviously having the man advantage certainly helps but sometimes that makes it more difficult.

“Credit to the boys, we played with variety. We tried to go through them, go round them, go over and two of the deliveries were outstanding.

“That is what my number nines do – if you put the service there, they will finish.”

Gerrard hailed Roofe’s impact and admitted he was thrilled to freshen up his side with six changes on the back of their Europa League defeat in Prague three days earlier.

He said: “Kem ran really hard for us for 70 minutes in midweek.

“We are not going to get all the decisions right but they need to trust us in terms of the 11 and the group.

“We have to make changes to keep that freshness and that energy because we wanted to be aggressive and play on the front foot and press.

“We were rewarded with the changes we made because the subs brought energy, brought quality and helped us get over the line in the end.”