Keep the zero. That was Gio van Bronckhorst ’s mantra in the early months of his reign. On Wednesday night his team almost kept the zero. The trouble is there was also almost a one in front of it.
Liverpool had 22 shots at Allan McGregor ’s goal, hit the target with nine of them and the back of the net with seven of them. If the game had lasted another five minutes, they might just have got to 10. After all, it took Mo Salah just a little longer than that to score three. Yes, Rangers were up against a team sprinkled with world class performers. There was not a single player in blue shirt who would get near Liverpool’s first team. That’s fine and that’s acceptable.
What should never be acceptable is the manner in which Rangers stopped playing from the minute Darwin Nunez stuck the third goal past McGregor with 25 minutes left. Stopped tracking back, stopped tackling, stopped closing down. This was a team containing seven of the players who beat RB Leipzig, now a quality Champions League team as Celtic can attest, only five months ago in the semi final of the Europa League.
