Where’s that Roman with the three nails and the mallet when ye need him? (Buddies … 0 GERS … 1)

It’s Easter, so we have to ask …

Was the ball egg-shaped?

Was the ball being kept as close to heaven as both teams could manage, in a tribute to Hesoos’s ascent to his faither’s lofty pad?

In watching such a brutal spectacle, were we, the paying public, being made to endure tortures fit to remind us of the crucifixion?

Did the number of head injuries, compatable with the permanently astral realm of the ball, indicate a desire to wear a modern day crown of thorns by way of tribute to the old Sanlal-wearing hippey responsible for all sectarianism in the West of Scotland?

We certainly helped RESURRECT Dunfermline’s hopes of SPL survival and Walter’s Second Coming still looks like the way, the truth and the light for most Bears but, while christians of the world celebrated the rolling away of a big rock near Golgotha, I wanted one rolled between me and the most famous pitch in Paisley.

We’ve stopped sellik winning the league before the split and second place is loking a bit mnore secure again - sorry but these “achievements” and the way they came about do NOT mean I have died and gone to heaven.

Frankly, this was about as hellish as it’s possible for a Rangers win to be.

It says it all that the only goal of this brutally awful game involved no finesse and no aesthetic beauty. A cross from Charlie Adams which intended target Kris Boyd did not touch was typical. Boyd’s presence resulted in a future Rangers player crashing into his own goalkeeper, with Kris the meat in the sandwich - none of them controlled the white spherical thing and all three men became superflous to the action as Nacho Novo kinda did control it, eight yards from a goal-line occupied by one St Mirren defender. As he did back on 22nd October, when also scoring the winner at Love Street, Nacho took his time over his touch and managed to rattle the ball straight at said Buddie. The baw smacked off both his legs before it eventually found its way over the line and into a net which, like its twin up the other end of the pitch, would remain otherwise untroubled.

Four minutes gone. 1-0 to the team at the second-top spot of the league, against the team at the second-bottom spot. A few more wasted chances later, it was obvious this game would be a carbon copy of Walter Smith’s second of his second coming, against Dunfermline at East End Park. That day a Charlie Adams goal within minutes of the kick-off promised a rout of relegation-threatened opponents but produced a nervy, dire, worryingly difficult 1-0 win. From Pars to Paisley and another eighty-odd minutes of frustration and worry which supplied three points and a further steadying of the ship so damaged by the internecine myopia of the first half of the season, a regaining of some basic on-field pride or, more accurately, an avoidance of further humiliation.

Dunno about you but I dont think it’ll be long til this isnae good enough for the same mob who got shot of Le Guen.

St Mirren, like the Pars, have given us some headaches this season, despite their very real chance of playing in the First Division next. St Mirren, like Dunfermline, play in Black and White and have a great Scottish Cup history despite never actually having been champions of Scotland.

St Mirren, like Dunfermline Athletic, were once managed by a Scotsman who went on to win the European Cup and, Love Street, like East End Park, sometimes seems to have been more damaged than improved by its conversion from a three-quarter terraced bowl to a coo-shed and bucket-seat “family” ground.

I’m getting off the point a bit, I know, but this is the kind of stuff I ended up thinking about for most of the 5th to 40th minutes today. Concocting tenuous, arbitary footballing coincidences was more interesting than watching Rangers continually get the ball behind St Mirren’s awful defence - unconvincingly marshalled by Captain Kirk Boradfoot, soon to be of the Starship Ibrox - and miss them with almost criminally negligent abandon.

From just before half time til the 94th minute, however, I found myself concentrating on only one really pertinent link between Dunfermline and St Mirren - Rangers, should hump both sides this season but cannae quite seem to manage it. The boredome had dissapeared, to be replaced by total frustration and head-numbing worry. Fear of failure is one thing but this season failed long agao - fear of indifferent performances from players with indifferent attitudes is what runs the shit out of me. Sod the windy weather and the bumpy pitch, Kris Boyd’s second successive blank and Barry Ferguson’s second-successive dissapearing act had me wondering if there was anyone left who actually cared.

Chris Burke? Was he there today? Well worth that new contract he almost left us for.

The defence was great, yes, but this was St Mirren - any goal for the home team shoudl have been reduced to the category of consolation long before half-time. Weir, Hutton, Papac, McGregor and Ehiogu should have been worried only about ruining the half of the scoreline they look after for its own sake - not because it could mean dropping more points to fodder or, even worse, handing the SPL title to shite.

Our attacks went from unfinished to non-existant. I’ve never seen a Rangers team give the ball given to the opposition so many times in a single game. Quite simply, Rangers couldnae pass water today.

No-one beyond the back four gets any kind of pass marks. We were shocking and the only miracle this Easter was that St Mirren’s forward play was even more inept than ours.

Barry and Boydy were the centre of the anti-Le Guen clique - they were all “heart-on-their-sleeve” Bluenose in their frustration at the Frenchman’s “un-Rangers” ways. Well, last week the two of them missed a number of sitters against ten men and denied us the chance to put some real fear up the legaue leaders. Today, again, when given the mantle, when offered the chance to prove they could secure something for Rangers - this time second place - they choked and dissapeared. They’ll show again when we’re playing Hearts, Hibs, Abedeen, Killie and Celtic. But real leaders, real Rangers men, do the boring, menial stuff too. At least when Walter hunts them for it he wont be hunted himself, as per Paul Le Guen.

There just wasn’t enough glory on offer for some of our players today, and the Ranges performance at Paisley was suitably inglorious.

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Published:
04.08.07 / 5pm
Category:
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