Rangers verdict: Scarves thrown and seats emptied as axe hovers over Michael Beale and his signings
It is difficult to see all that is sure to be hurled at the Englishman in the coming days won’t ultimately fell him. Sooner rather than later. Even as all but a slither of the Rangers fanbase now want him to be jettisoned from their club yesterday. The boos that greeted the final whistle weren’t as voluble as have been heard recently. Indeed, they did not prove as ear-splitting as those at the conclusion of the 1-0 defeat to Celtic a month ago, that set in motion a seemingly inexorable slide towards the exit door for Beale. But that was only because there were vast - truly vast - expanses of empty seats across the stands by the time referee Steven McLean sounded his final whistle to confirm Aberdeen’s first win at the home of their most hated adversaries since a Scottish Cup triumph in March 2019.
It is hard to pinpoint precisely what was most unforgivable about Rangers against Barry Robson’s men, since so much was defective. They are damned by the fact that they were eviscerated by a team that patently had a game plan as they proved devoid of one. Drill down further and the fact their visitors could prove largely passive in the early stages as they looked to sit in and seek to catch the Ibrox men on the counter and not be punished exposed Rangers’ myriad frontline deficiencies. It is desperately unfortunate for Beale to be deprived of so many players through injury in the front third with Kemar Roofe, Danilo, Rabbi Matondo, Todd Cantwell, Tom Lawrence and Nicolas Raskin all sidelined.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide AdYet the two players who prevented Rangers turning their territorial dominance into something tangible across the first half hour were both bought to be starters, to be performers who could elevate the Ibrox side. Instead Cyriel Dessers was unable to find other than the outstretched hands of keeper Kelle Roos when delivered a cross from Ryan Jack begging to nodded into the net inside 20 minutes. Before Jose Cifuentes proved hopeless when failing to connect with a James Tavernier ball practically dropped on to his head a quarter of an hour later.
Dessers has become the whipping boy for the Rangers support in the £4m buy from Cremonese appearing unable to do right for doing wrong. It is painful to watch his flailing…and his being flailed from the stands. “He’s not living in the best moment of his career,” said Beale, with masterful understatement. “He twice been top scorer in Eredivisie and top scorer in the Conference League at Feyenoord but he’s found it difficult. I’m sure given time he will show his quality but it’s fair he’s below the level he’d like to be.”
The Rangers manager knows the Nigerian international is in good/bad company. The stick with which Gioanni van Bronckhorst was beaten as he lost his job last November was his previous summer’s recruitment. There isn’t a single player in the Ibrox squad whether new or long-standing - save for keeper Jack Butland - at the level required of them by their club. A collective failing exposed by the calamitious defending that resulted in Aberdeen taking them to the cleaners. The Pittodrie men providing a punch that left the home team drunk on disaster. With Beale side-stepping a question over the poor returns from summer signings. “The whole squad is accountable and the staff too,” he said. “I don’t want to go into individual players. We’ve been Jekyll and Hyde. The problem in this club is we win a lot but when it comes down to decisive moments we create a lot and our conversion isn’t high enough. That leads to anxiety on the pitch and in the stands. We shouldn’t concede three at home in a game like today, no chance.”
Yet, Rangers were so slapdash at the back, so excruciatingly inept, Aberdeen’s force of will, their ability to seize their moments, meant they were worthy of a first three-goal haul at the ground since a 3-3 draw almost exactly 26 years earlier. A corner from the right fizzed in by Leighton Clarkson proved the genesis for the opener, Cifuentes dropping Stefan Gartenmann at the back post to allow the Danish defender to slid in for a first-time finish from the edge of the six-yard box. Aberdeen’s second in the 68th minute, which had the home support streaming for the exits, was the stuff of the Sunday morning youth football. The absence of conviction of command across the Ibrox backline resulted in a form of footballing bagatelle ensuing from a corner. A series of shots led to the ball bouncing around before Richard Jensen fired through a ruck of bodies which led to an unsighted Butland slapping into the path of Jamie McGrath, who hooked the ball down and bouncing up and beyond the English international.
Two minutes later, an incidence as unfamiliar as so much that had gone before occurred when substitute Scott Wright, only on as a half-time replacement for Ryan Jack, was shown a red card for a second bookable offence. The result of the attacker proving late and clumsy in a challenge with Gartenmann, having earned a caution for a foul on Jack McKenzie only 12 minutes earlier. The dismissal made for the first time in four years that any Rangers player had been sent-off in a league game at Ibrox. The jig seemed up for Rangers then, but they didn’t simply accept their fate, to their credit. And in the 75th minute, Abdallah Sima was on hand to tap in after Cifuentes had squeezed the ball across the face of the goal from the right subsequent to Roos failing to collect a cross.
However, any hopes of even a modicum of respite for beleaguered Beale were short-lived. MacKenzie making it 3-1 in the 85th minute when he smacked the ball in off the underside of the bar after Butland failed to cover himself in glorying in dealing with a Jonny Hayes drive. It was a common theme.