The Nacho has landed (Dee … 0 GERS …2)

Oh, and before I get into it, can I just say BOB MALCOLM - The Gers@openFootie Man Of The Match today. Nach is gonnae steal all the headlines and he could just have set himself up as Player of the season with his domestiuc duck-breaking double but Roberto Malcolm was, overall, our most consistent contributor on Tayside this avo. He showed himself today to be a Fantastically Talented Player. I mean, Robert was just giving it Full Tilt Power and Finally Turned Poterntial into reality when he commanded the midfield at Dens with some Ferocious Tackling Prowess and Faultlessly True Passing. He was sitting in front of the back- four and just behind the Ricksen-Hughes midfield engine but the big fellah’s calm control and deceptively skilful distribution of the ball was a joy to behold. He was the lynch-pin and his was, all in all, a Fu**ing Tremendous Performance.

The game turned on Nacho Novo’s introduction to the play after, what, seventy plus minutes? Again, McLeish is the man who dropped him so if the manager deserves our rancour for demoting Nach to the bench, then does he not deserve our praise for bringing him on? The trouble is, as with the diminuitive Spaniard’s even-later arrival on the pitch during the CIS Cup match at Pittodrie on Wednesday, the player’s effect on the game was so powerful and so instant that McLeish looks rather foolish for not having played him from the start.

However, then again, McLeish is more aware than anyone that anything but a win these days is likely to cost him his job. If he can bring Craig Moore back into the fold after such a public disagreement, he’s obviously not dropping players just to prove some personal point of stubborness. So did he take the gamble of dropping Novo onto the bench, knowing that that’s what it would take to finally get the player to actually score, rather than simply find the positions and upset defences. As Rangers are now suddenly on a three-game winning streak and have conceded just once in their last five outings, it’s time to give Big Alex a break. Benefit of the doubt time in respect of the Ginger Gaffer.

God knows, if he was gambling, he certainly doesn’t do it by halves. This was House And Car on Red stuff. Dropping Novo for a second game on the trot and then taking Stephen Hughes off after probably the best hour that guy’s had in a Rangers away game for over a year. Bringing Lovenkrands on BEFORE Novo. We were ten minutes from a thoroughly humiliating and probably record-breaking fourth successive league game on the road without a goal. Big Eck was, as opined during the week, ten minutes away from the sack and then suddenly Novo exploded onto the scene.

Who’s to say it wasn’t Eck’s deployment of players who gradually srecthed Dundee wider which actually made it possible for Novo to have an impact? Who’s to say it wasn’t just a matter of time til ANY Rangers player scored a goal at Dens today? We won 2-0 so the manager deserves our vote of confidence but when Novo went over to the bench to “celebrate” the second goal with McLeish, you got the impression the wee man was playing diplomat. “You’re the boss,” he was saying as he gave Eck a not-so-high five, “But you’ll only stay the boss with my help”.

Ach, what a turn-around! We’d dominated posession without ever really threatening their goal. As with the Aberdeen game during the week, the home side was the one creating the best chances, despite our positively indecent familiarity with the white spherical thing. Sutton and Larsen playing up front against us - aye, very good. When their Norwegian number 7 hit the post you could just see the kind of headlines which would get Eck the boot through our sheer annoyance at the poetry of it all.

Marvin Andrews did okay in the absence of fever-struck Craig Moore, but not before he had another one of those suicidally obtuse moments he endured against Livvy earlier this season. Slipping and falling on the ball when there’s no-one within ten yards of you is the kind of thing I do at the fives (and I do it DAMNED gracefully too!) - but it’s NOT for Rangers defenders on SPL Duty. Naw? Well, what he hell was Zhurab Kishanishvilhi doing when he decided to play Dundee in for that aforementined shot off Stef’s post?? We weren’t losing goals - yet again - but we looked far from assured in defence - yet again.

Stephen Thompson did well, as he had in midweek. He is a capable, honest big fellaha and I just bloody like him. He got stuck in and kept Brent Sancho and Bobby Mann busy - yet ye can’t help thinking Prso will be back in there to replace Stephano as soon as the Croat is fit again. Arveladze was posted missing once more and I actually think we missed Vanoli in midfield, playing him at left back today.

Wee Burkey was doing OKAY but Jonay Hernadez was giving as good as he got down that flank and all we really had at half-time was the memory of a few well-parried shots on goal and a sequence of pressure which didn’t begin until the 27th minute with our first corner of the game, was over by the 40th minute and had produced nothing but a series of “what ifs”.

But Vignal came on for Vanoli and his first good cross of the game, to the back post, saw WEE Chris Burke get his Ginge Fringe on the ball. He squared it back across goal and Nacho Novo was there, all alone, to steer the thing into the unguarded net from a few yards and spark a cathartic, pivotal, seminal moment in his Rangers career and - HOPEFULLY - this entire season. It felt like a weight off and I, like a few of you, went totally fekin ballistic.

Of course, it should never have been a goal because Stef picked up a clear pass-back from Burkey just a minute earlier but - HEY - we’re Rangers, the refs always favour us.

We’d been dreadful to watch in the first half hour. We’d been mereley distracting in the next half hour and only the desperate need for a bloody goal and the knowledge that failure to get one would result in managerial change - had us interested in the next twenty minutes. But on 80 minutes everything started making sense again. Novo scores into the Bobby Cox end at Dens and heads off to take the adulation of “The Derry”, as it’s known on Dens Road and Sandeman Street. Okay, he’s wearing the RED of Rangers this time (How sooperb is that away strip by the way - really smart!) and it’s a covered enclosure full of LIGHT-Bluenoses this time but it’s a routine he knows so well - scoring at Dens - and one we know so well - winning at Dens. Suddenly two worlds collided and everyone relaxed:

The next goal just summed up the stress-busting nature of that first goal. We only had to wait two minutes for it. Burke took Hernandes to pieces in a way he never could up til then - real wing wizard, humiliation stuff. He HIT THE BY-LINE (Ooooh!), then PULLED IT BACK (eeeeeh!) for Stepahen Thomspson to let it run by him with a well-judged DUMMY (aaaaah!) and there was Novo, smacking it low and hard from the edge of the box into the far corner of Soutar’s net (YEEESSSS!!!).

Can’t believe he didnae get a hat-trick, because it felt like that kind of day as soon as he got his first. But I wouldn’t be too surprised if he got three on Thursday (just depends on how many we lose!). At last, we’ve broken the results into a performance and now we have to transmute it into a SEASON. It’s still all about Thursday and it’s still a seriously hazardous match but suddenly I feel so much happier about this Rangers team. Well, we’ve just won 2-0 - I suppose it’s only Nach’!

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Published:
09.26.04 / 7pm
Category:
News