DMAA

26 minutes ago, the gunslinger said:

Yeah very late on monday night and a full team. 

 

Let's hope they are concentrating on the league

The league is the priority for them, no different to us, and with 6 points on the board they won't be too worried about EL. I still expect them to put out a strong side, probably their strongest. 

2 hours ago, Frankie said:

FWIW, I'm expecting a team along the following lines.  It may be Barker starts instead of Kent or Aribo but I'd imagine the manager will want to play his strongest team (at this moment in time at least) and I'd argue this is it for now.

 

 

2 hours ago, Rousseau said:

I think it'll be a counter-attacking side. 

It's going to be very interesting. Against Willem II and Standard Liege it was Kent & Hagi. But against stronger opposition, Leverkusen, it was Kent & Barker. Benfica are strong but not in Leverkusen's league.

I hope Aribo gets the nod. There just isn't enough technical ability in the Morelos, Kent, Barker trio in my opinion. Aribo gives you a target for bringing down long balls and holding the ball up really well, as well as more ability to pick a pass and create chances. I wouldn't be surprised to see Roofe play too. Rested at the weekend and he has much more pace than Morelos. I would be more confident in our ability to create chances and score goals with a trio of Roofe, Aribo, Kent.

1 hour ago, Bill said:

both Edmundson and Jones should be released from their contracts immediately.

I think this is highly unlikely. Even if we are able to do it without legal issues, the fact is that they are assets and you have to worry about precedent. There is always a risk that one of our £10m+ players will try to get off with what they see as a minor breach and we couldn't treat them any differently, and we just aren't going to throw money away like that. Maybe loans are the next move. Very disappointed about Edmundsons in particular, I think he has a lot of potential.

It’s quite incredible how much a pitch can negatively impact a game but many players didn’t play that well and the pitch has to have played quite a big part. Helander in particular seemed to struggle. He was his usual reliable self aside from I think 3 separate incidents where he just seemed to slip/lose his footing. Really uncharacteristic for him. Barisic definitely had issues with his crossing due to the pitch. I would add Kent to that list, that is all I will say about that. 
 

I think Aribo was generally very good. Hopefully it won’t be long until he is fully fit, he is such a good player. Pleased with Itten and still confused why he hasn’t been given more opportunities. Tavernier was very good. No big standout for me on this occasion. 

2 hours ago, Rousseau said:

Depends which player it is and who's responding. 

 

If it's Tavernier, @der Berliner would have him hung, drawn and quartered. 

 

If it's Kent, @DMAA would use it as another example of why Kent's not good enough. 

 

If it's Barker, @ian1964 will have the taxi drawing up at Auchenhowie. 

 

If it's Morelos, it's another example of a disciplinary issue. 

 

If it's Kevin Thomson, @craig would be saying he's actually great with his kid, and the virus probably started it. 

 

Say what you will, though, Josh Windass would never be caught in this type of situation. ? 

I heard it was Kent, JJ asked to take the hit

Seems this was caught quickly, party was last night. So it looks like we are in the clear, there won’t be any postponements. 

2 hours ago, Thinker said:

As mentioned, Jones has a history of this kind of stuff, but I'm disappointed and surprised at Edmundson - he always seemed to have his head screwed on better than this.

Yeh I agree with that. I said on this forum during the Bolognoli thing that Jones was going to be a risk for this kind of thing. Very predictable unfortunately.

0-1 Rangers

morelos

4 hours ago, Rousseau said:

Kamara encapsulates the benefits that stats can bring to player recruitment. 

 

He was not a player that stood out in a poor Dundee side, and they actually didn't play him that much, from what I remember, simply because he didn't suit what they wanted. 

 

Yet, the stat trackers were always singing his praises: he was consistently top of the league when it came to some stats (not all), like passing, key passes, interceptions etc. 

 

It was clear that there was a player there, if only someone could utilise his skill set. 

As a fellow stat fan, couldn’t agree more. However he was a stick on starter for Dundee aside from injury and the run up to signing us when everyone knew he was leaving. But a lot of their fans had been critical of his performance in the season we signed him. This was under McIntyre who I don’t think played the way McCann did. 

42 minutes ago, craig said:

DMAA's avatar suggests inherent bias   

1 hour ago, Rousseau said:

If we compare the goals scored in the group stages/proper rounds (excluding qualifiers) and where those teams finished in their leagues:

 

McCoist:
CL: 4 goals - Leeds (C), Grasshoppers (C)
EL: 3 goals - Bohemians (-), Ives (-), Boavista (5)

 

Morelos:
EL: 9 goals - Rapid Vienna (2), Porto (C), Young Boys (C), Feyenoord (3), Lech Poznan (2).

 

Morelos shades it, for me. 

 

The Europa League definitely looks a more difficult prospect now - McCoist was playing against sides from Ireland and Finland!

 

 

50 minutes ago, Bluedell said:

I'd argue Leeds was a qualifier.

Arbitrary to try to compare still for me. The teams Ally didn’t score against are as important as the ones he did. Rangers underperformed but the level of opposition in the Champions League groups was far higher than EL groups today. 
And you have to include his European Cup goals where he scored against champions of Ukraine, Poland, Romania, Serbia and...well, Malta. Some of these teams were really strong and had won both competitions in question in that period. 

2 hours ago, Bluedell said:

 

 

9 of Ally's 21 goals were where Rangers scored 10 or more goals or aggregate against the likes of Valetta and Gi Gotu. Another was the 4th in a 4-0 win. Another 2 were penalties.

 

Ally managed 2 goals in European group stages. Alfredo has managed 9.

 

Ally scored important European goals against Boavista, Kiev, Gornik, Leeds and Grasshoppers over 14 seasons.

 

Alfredo has scored important European goals against Osijek, Maribor, Rapid Vienna, Midtjylland, Legia, Porto, Feynoord, Young Boys and Lech Poznan over 3 seasons, some of whom were in the Champions League either the previous or following seasons.

 

Alfredo's European goal scoring record is arguably far better than Ally's.

The comparison is still just unfair, so I don't like it. The vast majority of Ally's European appearances were against champions. He played against the champions of Italy, Germany, Holland, France, Belgium, England, Russia, Belgium etc, and as we know Rangers badly struggled to challenge those sides. Unlike today, our managers just couldn't crack Europe, and part of that was probably just that opposition were the cream of each country and just stronger than we face in the Europa League today.

That is not a slight on Alfie's European record for one second. 6 of his goals have been against Gibraltan part timers but the rest have been very valuable goals against good teams. I just don't see the value in comparing it to a different time when we played in very different competition.

8 minutes ago, rbr said:

Another small point , this Poznan team had 19 shots on target against Benfica , albeit they were at home , tonight they had 1 .

 

They had 9 shots on target against Benfica and 0 tonight

5 minutes ago, rbr said:

This is actually very unfair and a poor comparison , as Ally didnt get to play anywhere near as many group games and the knockout rounds were much more difficult back in his day 

Yeh I don’t like this stat. Most his games were against champions. He didn’t have the benefit of an annual gimme in Gibraltar. 

4 minutes ago, ian1964 said:

 

Trolling

Another 500 grand in the bank too

Really good result. 3 points was all that mattered and a number of players have been kept fresh for a huge game at Rugby Park on Sunday. 

0 shots on target for Poznań. Love it. 

1 minute ago, RabiDuck said:

On the bright side. Defence holding up as we've come to expect this season. Shots on target :: 0!

I’d be surprised if it stays like that. They are going to throw men forward. I wish we had Helander on, trust him more than Balogun. 

Really good move there 

And yet another assists from Barisic

4 minutes ago, DMAA said:

Hopefully see a lot of hunger from Morelos here

Yessss

Hopefully see a lot of hunger from Morelos here. Kent and Hagi need to do better. 

Can’t believe the slackness here. That pass from Kent about 15 yards away from the man sums it up.