Antonio Colak slams disrespectful Dundee United fans as Tannadice club release statement

Rangers striker Antonio Colak celebrates making it 1-0 against Dundee United in the Ibrox side's 2-0 win (Photo by Alan Harvey / SNS Group)

But the victory was overshadowed when some away fans disrupted the minute’s silence held in tribute to Queen Elizabeth II.

Dundee United later released a two paragraph statement and refused to let caretaker manager Liam Fox answer questions about the pre-match scenes. There was fury inside Ibrox as a section of the United supporters booed, shouted and chanted throughout the intended silence. But the Tannadice club opted only to acknowledge the disruption had happened in a short response afterwards.

“Dundee United are aware of the actions of a small section of the crowd who chose to not respect the minute's silence before this afternoon's match at Ibrox,” the statement said.

“As a club, ahead of the game we reached out to advise our supporters of the pre-match arrangements with the expectation that the minute silence would be observed.”

Colak ran to the United fans after opening the scoring in the eighth minute and put a finger to his lips. The Croatian striker said he was disappointed by the lack of respect from those United fans who had chosen to disrupt the silence.

“We were standing silently before the start of the game - everyone knows why,” he said. “It’s all about respect.

“For me, when I scored, it was just my emotions. There was over 50,000 in the stadium and everybody had respect. But some people hadn’t had that.

“I think in that moment everybody should understand that. Afterwards everybody showed the right way of showing respect.”

Colak has now scored nine goals in 13 appearances for Rangers this season. He responded impressively to being dropped to the bench for the midweek Champions League defeat to Napoli. Alfredo Morelos, who replaced Colak on Wednesday night, remained on the bench throughout against United.

Van Bronckhorst gave starts to teenage centre-half Leon King and 20-year-old midfielder Charlie McCann. The manager later charged others to take the pressure off Colak, who is the only player scoring regularly for the side at present. He acknowledged Ryan Kent must start scoring more goals than is the case at present. The winger was a peripheral figure again against United.

“Before the three defeats we had players scoring from midfield,” noted Van Bronckhorst. “Tom Lawrence is one of the players who has started the season really well as well. Unfortunately, we don’t have him.

“Hopefully we will have him back after the break. We have to have more players to be able to score. Ryan Kent is a player who is very dangerous, but also needs to improve his scoring. He knows that he needs to improve that.

“Rabbi (Matondo) is a player who can deliver that. He is one of the players I didn’t pick today because I had to go from 23 to 20, which is always difficult for a manager to do so.”

Meanwhile, United caretaker manager Fox believes his own future will be confirmed “in the next couple of days”. Fox is in the running to be handed the job on a permanent basis amid reports also linking the Tannadice club with Kevin Thomson and former Bristol City manager Dean Holden.