Giovanni van Bronckhorst pleased with Rangers desire as winning run continues

Posted Sunday, December 05, 2021 by PA

Giovanni van Bronckhorst was delighted with the desire Rangers showed in their dominant 3-0 cinch Premiership win over Dundee at Ibrox.

Midfielder Joe Aribo’s deflected strike in the 36th minute gave the relentless champions a deserved lead before his cut-back in the 55th minute was put into his own net by visiting defender Ryan Sweeney.

Dundee’s busy keeper Adam Legzdins pulled off a series of saves as Rangers kept up the pressure but striker Alfredo Morelos scored a third in the 70th minute of a one-sided encounter to make it four wins out of four for Van Bronckhorst since taking over the Ibrox hotseat.

The former Gers player said: “We were controlled which is what you want when you play at home.

“We created a lot of chances and did not give any chances away.

“Even at 3-0 up we were still looking for the fourth goal, that is the desire we need in games.

“I am very happy with the performance and of course, happy with the points.”

Rangers moved seven points ahead of second-placed Celtic who get the chance to reduce the lead at Dundee United on Sunday.

Van Bronckhorst, who took over from Steven Gerrard last month, believes he is starting to see his ideas come to fruition.

He said: “We worked hard to get the passing game up, at speed, especially against opponents who are organised and defended really well.

“You need that flow of passing and today we did really well.

“You could see that the more minutes we played, the more space we got and we also changed the direction of play quickly and dominated those areas.”

Dundee boss James McPake was unimpressed by the behaviour of the Rangers players when Leigh Griffiths, on loan from Celtic and who came on as a second-half substitute, got booked by referee Alan Muir for foul on Aribo.

Morelos was also booked in the ensuing melee and Griffiths survived picking up another yellow card for a subsequent foul on Calvin Bassey.

McPake said: “He is going to get a hostile reception. He gets a hostile reception everywhere he goes.

“It never crossed my mind to say: ‘I’m worried about putting him on’. Leigh’s a character who can take it on.

“You could see what they were trying to do, in my opinion.

“He gets booked. I’ve not seen the tackle. Then all of a sudden there’s a riot about to happen because it’s Leigh.

“Rangers players were coming in from everywhere.

“Fair play to my players. That’s what I want to see from my team, togetherness.

“Paul McMullan, Liam Fontaine, Ryan Sweeney, Paul McGowan all getting involved to help their team mate out.

“To me, there was nothing in it. What I will say was I was miles away so I would need to see that from the analyst to see if that is worthy of a booking.

“If it is then Alan has got one right.”

McPake got himself booked later and explained: “The fourth official thought I made a comment to him, which I didn’t. I made the comment to someone else.”