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A warm blast from the West: St Johnstone v Rangers Match Preview Just when I thought the winter Olympics were finished our supporters have to travel up or down to Perth where we meet St Johnstone which will probably be like watching football on Ice. Well the field with under-soil heating will make the park playable but with minus eleven degrees predicted the heating will be well tested to keep the park soft. The big worry for me is the weather conditions supporters will have to travel in before and after the match. I hope the S.F.A. take this into consideration and cancel the game early, if need be, before people travel if it looks like the weather could turn into a winter wonderland. Last weekend the team put on an extremely polished performance against Hearts. Apart from the first fifteen minutes we really had Hearts pinned back in their own half. A fantastic goal from Jamie Murphy, who in scoring sold more dummies than Boots the chemist, before side footing the ball into the net leaving two defenders on the goal-line looking like puppets that had just broken their strings, with their hands and legs flailing in all directions. If we have a complaint then it has to be that the score should have been far higher. Josh Windass could have easily had another match ball as he missed at least three chances that he really should have scored. Alfredo Morelos also had a chance with a header but the cross was just too high for him and let's face it Buffalo's are not known for their jumping ability. If you look at the heading chances we have had this season then I think you can safely say that is a skill we certainly can improve on. On saying that I don't really care how the ball enters the opposition net. Another point that popped up was that John Beaton was the referee for the first time since his horrid performance against Hibs. Lets be clear on the uproar over that performance this was just not the wrath of defeated supporters, he wasn't demoted to the lower leagues for nothing and that says it all really. While he actually had a decent game he missed the biggest decision he had to make and that was a clear foul by Christophe Berra kicking the supporting foot of Alfredo Morelos away. Beaton even gave a foul against Morelos which was a little mystifying. Unexpected hero Russell martin sliding in at the back post got his first goal in a Rangers Shirt and made sure of the points just before the clock moved on to the 90th minute. Securing the win which was really never in doubt after the first fifteen minutes. So tonight Rangers go again against St Johnstone.Yesterday the news broke that Declan John will be out for at least four weeks so that is the first problem that Graeme Murty will have to consider. He has three options in my opinion. Lee Wallace would normally be his first choice but as it will be his first game back after months of injury lay-off will it be wise to push him in on such cold conditions. Andy Halliday came in to cover the last time John fell out so he may get the nod to fill the left back position. Lee Hodson is also an option but he has fallen out of favour recently and certainly wouldn't be the fans choice. The General conscensus being that Hodson now falls below the standard of the present Rangers team. I really can't see Mutry changing too much else to be honest. The midfield was outstanding on Saturday and the old adage is that you should never change a winning team. I suppose he may consider bringing in jason Cummings for Alfredo Morelos or Josh Windass but I think he will wait to Saturdays Scottish Cup game with Falkirk to do that. It would be better in my view to give the Cumdog a little more game time than seventeen minutes at the end of the game though. He should get at least a good half-hour to keep him happy and hungry for more. I think the team will be: Foderingham Tavernier Bates Martin Halliday Candeias Docherty Goss Murphy Windass Morelos So let's hope that driving conditions for the supporters stay good and the terraces are snow free. Secondly I hope the Rangers team produce a red hot blast of football to to keep the fans clapping their hands and jumping up and down. Every game is a must win game now if we want to put a late push on for the league title. Every goal scored or lost could be pivotal if Celtic should slip up.Let's hope the Gers are on fire. C'mon the Gers!!

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Goss MOTM for me, class player and scored a class goal

Hi all, It may just be my age talking here but that second goal felt like sex............ Bet you missed such pearls of wisdom, eh?

It's hard to believe how much better they have been than us against the rest of the league. If you discount their games against us, they'd be 9 points ahead of us! If you discount their games against Celtic, they'd be joint top with them. If you discount games between the three teams they'd be 4 points clear of Celtic and 10 points clear of us. They've only dropped points against a bottom 6 side twice all season, and one of them was Motherwell who were top 6 at the time and high flying. Only 1 loss against a non-old firm side to our 6. Hopefully this disparity between our ability to beat the 4th-12th sides no longer exists - as we're starting to hope - and we will get 4 in a row ahead of the game against Celtic, and with that new found winning formula finally open up that much needed gap with Aberdeen.

I'm sure a ref has done similar for one of our players in the past. as others have said, as long as it's done on a consistent basis then there's no issue.

I'd love to get Goss on a permanent deal; I'd fork out a few million for him...

Where was his warning for Jack?

The player should have been sent off before half-time. After he was booked he had two late tackles - one very late (on Docherty?) which the official failed to punish.

Aslong as a ref. will do the same for both teams, I'd agree.

Keeper should have been off as well. No question about it.

Great result. Here's hoping this continues - feeling good tonight!

I might be wrong but I thought I seen Murphy mouth he thought it was broken? I hope not but it was another shocker of a challenge that went unpunished. Great performance tonight and some of the passing first half was fantastic.

Well, the game (and our performance) understandably died a death but it's job done again and credit to the manager and players for maintaining their levels on a tricky pitch. No real stand outs but Morelos' attitude really is fantastic and I think we should start a fund now to pay for Goss. In terms of the refereeing, Rangers have to speak out - it's just not good enough and the officials' leniency shown tonight has resulted in another of our players being injured.

To only book Kane for kicking Bates is completely ridiculous given the red cards Ryan Jack has had this season. Atrocious refereeing - he bottled it, simply as that.

Really good stuff. Docherty does a great job in the middle. He’s the kind of guy you hate marking you, rapid and strong. You just can’t get more than a few yards away from him. Fantastic assist from him too. Team looks very organised and with good shape.

Guys -- You're embarrassing yourselves with these static images. Gifs are the only way to go.

That would be to the detriment, probably, of the player. Why not continue to allow loans but enforce a rule which means that their parent club can't prevent them from playing against them ?

Stop talking baws; may I introduce you to The Mitre Mouldmaster: not so much a football, more an instrument of torture?

He would have dismissed our player, at his earliest opportunity, and with malign delight.

Time for the...........

I think there's truth in that Craig but I'm not sure it has quite as much to do with it as you suggest. I think Aberdeen have a winning formula that we hadn't found. They play basic yet effective football that scores goals. I would be especially interested to see how many headed goals they have scored this season and last compared to us. As for the disparity between their results against 4th-12th and 1st-2nd, there must be a lot of reasons. One simple one to partially account for the Celtic losses is that they can't play their best player against them, Christie. Their attacking play revolves around him in the rest of their games, it's a huge change to adjust to when they play Celtic. It didn't help that Shinnie was suspended either for that last one having been an ever present. Personally I think Murty's very good big game record plays a part in their poor results against us. We don't know how he does it but he does. After all Aberdeen had a 50-50 record vs Warburton and Caixinha. It's only fallen apart for them since Murty's been in charge. They would claim the double header in November was due to the McInnes saga of course, and that probably did play a part though it obviously wasn't the sole reason as they claim.

I doubt anyone would oppose that it's a common sense approach. However, one does wonder if Mr Beaton would have offered the same counsel to Murty or, say Docherty, if the midfielder had been booked early on.

I remember Pedro playing three at the back up in a midweek fixture up in Perth and it was effective, middle to front for about half an hour.

That's an extreme long shot. Mexican pundits expressed the thought that going to Rangers under Caixinha might spark his career aftera prolonged lull, no. Some may have thought returning to Mexico with Cruz Azul might get him going, no. He seems to have retired from professional football without actually telling anyone. #Payoff

good that the ref put out that warning........think he did right

I don't see how he could possibly give the St Johnstone player just a yellow for the kick at Bates. He has clearly seen the incident so it cannot be anything other than a straight red. And Morelos first half goal should have stood or a penalty awarded for Shaughnessy holding Bates

Sadly he's never played a decent game for Rangers bad signing in the first place .

Very interesting stats there from DMAA, thanks for that. I did get the impression that Dolly are very consistent against the other sides, especially the lower sides in the league, and this backs that up, but I perhaps didnt realise just how consistent and impressive they have been. Obviously much has been made of their constant capitulations against us/them, but it shows you they have got the job done against the "diddies" which we have really struggled to do over the last 2 years.

Good post DMAA You look at Aberdeen and you think if we get our act together then surely we can do that. We know we can get results in bigger games, although we really need to beat Celtic soon to get that monkey off our backs. Now is the time.

Alves coming in for John sounds good, but the change in formation would be bad for Murphy and Candeias. We've been making very good use of the wings so this would be to big a change I think. I'd hope Wallace can manage even 45 minutes but we'll see.

Fake news.

If a settled team keep winning then I don't mind predictability.

Actually, I don’t want to look as good as Brenda. He’s an ugly bastard!

It's turning into just another commercial business, which totally defeats the original point of football. David Conn's book, 'Richer Than God' really opened my eyes to how ugly it all is.

It is registered as a 'Newspaper', but, to even the barely sentient, it is no more than a cage liner for canaries.