FREED from the restraints of the Champions League, Rangers are up and running again.
Walter Smith yesterday acknowledged as much. Competing in European football’s premier club competition should be an honour and a pleasure, but not if your team is playing poorly, with uncertainty about the club’s very future rumbling on in the background.
After a Champions League campaign that yielded just two points from six matches and three heavy home defeats, few inside Ibrox are shedding tears that it’s all over. It may be a mere coincidence but there is little doubt there has been a fluidity about Rangers in recent weeks that was markedly absent during their stuttering start to the season, now that domestic chores are all they need to concern themselves with.
Injuries and suspensions have also abated, formerly forgotten players thrust back into the action to good effect. There is a new balance about Rangers that is easy on the eye, with DaMarcus Beasley and Nacho Novo tearing up and down the flanks, Steven Davis looking to motor forward from the middle of the park, and either Lee McCulloch or Kevin Thomson hanging back to offer further protection to the back four.
If St Johnstone being contemptuously cast aside at Ibrox last weekend was barely a surprise, a consecutive 3-0 victory at Tannadice in midweek, that took Rangers back to to the top of the Clydesdale Bank Premier League, raised more than a few more eyebrows. Smith oversaw it all with a quiet satisfaction.
The Champions League is a difficult environment to play in if you’re not right at the top of your game and we haven’t been. If you play well you get a terrific boost from it but the opposite applies too. Walter Smith
There is almost no chance of him recruiting reinforcements in January – Jerome Rothen, in fact, will head out the door when his disappointing loan spell is brought to a premature end – but if he can avoid losing any more out the door and keep the bulk of his squad fit, you get the impression Smith feels Rangers might just do okay this season.
“We’ve got to be pleased by the way that we’ve played in the last couple of games,” he said. “There has been an awful lot happening around the place that hasn’t been good. So to go to the top of the league is a good thing for all of the boys. It gives them a bit of a lift. It’s where you want to be all the time, while appreciating that you can’t be there all of the time. But it’s nice to be there again, especially with the games we’ve got coming up.
“Depending on results over the holiday period, the league come January could be as tight as it’s been for many, many years. So it was important that we did get a win the other day and move top again. Tuesday night [at Tannadice] was probably as consistent a performance as we’ve had this season.”
Smith admitted there was little satisfaction to be taken from Rangers’ fleeting stay in Europe this season. “The Champions League is a difficult environment to play in if you’re not right at the top of your game and we haven’t been,” he added. “If you play well you get a terrific boost from it but the opposite applies too.
“That definitely has an influence on what happened in the first part of the season. But we’ve not got that now and in the last couple of weeks we’ve been brighter than before. Hopefully we can continue that and if we can keep our group fit, and we’ll have to, then we will attempt to go on a similar type of run as we achieved last year.”
Beasley’s return has been key. The American has struggled to make a lasting impact at Ibrox after sustaining one injury after the next, but the prospect of featuring in next summer’s World Cup finals seems to have helped focus the mind.
“When we brought him in at first I thought we were short in the wider areas of the pitch and we have been,” Smith added. “We’ve never been able to get someone who could play consistently in that area of the pitch for us. So hopefully he can continue in the way he’s going at the moment.
“He’s got around 90 caps for America so I’d imagine he’d be keen to get to 100. Players all have their own motivation. If it’s the World Cup or whatever then fair enough, as long as they keep playing and are a benefit to the team.”
He will soon be joined by his compatriot, Maurice Edu, who will play in a bounce match on Monday as he nears the end of his rehabilitation from a lengthy knee injury – and a subsequent minor ankle knock – and who could yet feature in the first team over the festive period.
“Maurice just wants to get back playing again,” Smith added. “He showed in the latter part of last season that he’s a good player so we’ll get him up and running again and hopefully get him kickstarted.
“He’s done enough training. He was nearly back until 10 days ago when he damaged his ankle in training. Now he’s back and he’s nearly ready. We will need to get him some games but I would hope he could come back in to the team right away.”
Next for Rangers is Motherwell at Ibrox this afternoon. Smith, who will likely reinstate Allan McGregor with Neil Alexander struggling with flu, was full of admiration for what Jim Gannon has achieved at Fir Park.
“I think he’s done well there. When you look at the turnover of staff, it’s never an easy circumstance to come in with that sort of turnover. They must have got rid of about 80% of their playing staff which is a remarkable change. To be sitting where they are at the moment is a terrific achievement.”
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