Rangers’ loss to Manchester United told us very little | OneFootball

So as we all know Rangers were rather easily put away by Premier League giants Manchester United at Murrayfield yesterday.

Aside reports that the stadium itself was a shambles (we understand the women’s facilities were repurposed men’s toilets) the fare on display from the designated away side (our Famous) was pretty much what we expected, even if the home side only secured two goals.

It was abundant to all Rangers fans watching this one that the side was miles below the quality of the Old Trafford giants, which is fair enough, but more worryingly our team seems considerably off the level even needed to overcome Hearts in two weeks.

From Jefte struggling terribly with defending, to Cyriel Dessers giving the ball away repeatedly, and slipping, and stumbling his way through the match, Rangers didn’t look much like a team, never mind a team ready to face competitive football.

Naturally we have another two friendlies, Birmingham and then Union Berlin, so there is more time to get in some direly-needed signings while also putting Philippe Clement’s ideas into action.

There is also the pointlessness of trying to measure oneself against a goliath like Man Utd who just spent over £100M on Zirkzee and Yoro (the latter was outstanding at Murrayfield) because it’s not our level, simple as that.

But as an aside we did have to laugh at John Brown suggesting Dessers ‘clearly has more strength’ than Yoro after the giant defender flattened Rangers’ striker in a 50/50 confrontation proving that despite being only 18, the kid is going all the way in the game. Dessers has never been one for power.

But back to the point, it was an unfair match to measure the team on – a colossus like Utd were always going to get the better of this match, and in fairness Rangers did carve out one or two half-decent chances while playing a measure of some reasonable football.

There was just a lack of conviction about much of it, best summed up when Scott Wright more or less clean through sclaffed at an angled shot in a hurry rather than taking it on a bit more and getting more purchase on his attempt.

Rangers did mostly try here, we can’t really fault the workrate.

Diomande actually had a very good match, while Barron was chasing (shadows a lot of the time admittedly) but was trying to press with some success.

Cortes had one or two good passes but looked immensely rusty – not overly surprising, where Tom Lawrence was his usual self, a touch or two decent and one rasping shot but never dictating anything.

But his second-half replacement Matondo was very, very poor, wasteful, sluggish, and pondorous.

And of course defence was abysmal – Dujon Sterling struggled to stop Murray and Sancho dictating play on his side, with the two overpowering him frequently, while Jefte was caught constantly (miserably being beaten by Amad for his stunning goal), and clearly failing to understand the basics of the game on his side.

Souttar and Davies had their moments but both were asleep for the second goal, which was in fairness a hell of a finish.

So we take little from this one, other than ‘relative’ confirmation the squad is considerably below the level we need. But we already knew that.

It also seems Sterling will be this/next season’s right-back despite all of Ibrox Noise’s protestations.

In the end? It’s hard to conclude much as we say, we can probably get a fractionally-better barometer when we face Birmingham. That’s the level we’ll most be up against this season.

But boy could we use more/better signings….