Glen Kamara sealed Rangers ’ weekend win over St Johnstone with the kind of calm finish that seems at odds with a goalscoring record he admits needs to improve.
The midfielder’s strike past Remi Matthews was his first of the season and he hadn’t scored since the 3-1 win over RB Leipzig in the semi final of last term’s Europa League. That, the Finnish international knows, is nothing to write home about but Kamara revealed he’s hoping to hit the target more often now that he has been encouraged by new boss Michael Beale to express himself more in forward areas of the pitch, rather than sitting behind the ball.
The former Dundee player had been reduced to a bit-part role by former boss Gio van Bronckhorst, but Beale, who worked with him in the manager’s first stint at the club as Steven Gerrard’s main coach, has restored Kamara to a regular starting slot and his confidence has soared as a result. After another astute performance on an afternoon when Rangers won comfortably but wasted a series of chances to make the scoreline more emphatic than 2-0, the 27-year-old is clearly enjoying his reunion with the manager.
And the feeling is mutual, with Beale saying after the match: “If I look at Glen’s performance, he played a fantastic pass for Alfredo Morelos in the first half and then scored a great goal. That’s like a new Glen Kamara, so he’s obviously listening to the messaging. He’s going to need to keep that up.”
The 27-year-old’s response to that was a smile. He said: “I’ll take it! I’ve had him here before, so I know what he wants from us as players and hopefully I can take that onto the pitch. He brought me here and has definitely helped me a lot in my career.
"I’m hoping I can repay him by going onto the pitch and playing well. He’s a really good coach on the training field and gives me confidence in myself.
“I used to be a striker as a kid and I feel that getting up the pitch a little bit more will help and getting into those kinds of positions will allow me to get more chances. It’s definitely something I want to add to my game.
"I don’t score too many goals but I was happy with that one. The manager is looking for a bit of creativity from everywhere, not just me. He wants it from the full-backs, the defenders, and whenever we have the chance to score we have to take our chances really.”
They didn’t do that well enough on Saturday, being denied on several occasions by St Johnstone’s excellent keeper Remi Matthews and being far too wasteful at other times. Kamara acknowledges that while the team is pleased with a run of nine wins and a draw in Beale’s first 10 games, there remains loads of room for improvement.
“It was probably not our best performance but we’re happy with the win,” he said. “I don’t think we had a great performance as a team.
"We haven’t been here at Ibrox for a whole month and we wanted to come home and put on a good performance. When they went down to 10 men, we had to control the game better. It wasn’t our best but we’ll take the three points.”
Two massive boosts for Rangers, though, came in the shape of a sparkling debut from Todd Cantwell, who showed an appetite to make things happen right from the start, and the substitute appearance of Ianis Hagi, who received the biggest roar of the day as the Rangers support welcomed back the Romanian from the ACL injury that robbed him of a year of his career.
“It’s been a tough 12 months for Ianis and we’re all happy to see him back,” Kamara said. “With the kind of quality he’s got, we can’t wait to have him back playing.
“He’s a creative player and that’s something we have definitely missed in the midfield. Hopefully he can add some goals and creativity to the team.
“I thought Todd was good as well. He played well. It’s all new, coming to a new team and he hasn’t trained much with us but he did well. It’s a massive jump (coming to Rangers).
"I’m not too sure what the crowds are like in Norwich, but he’ll realise very soon that there are big expectations here. We’ve got to win every game and hopefully he’ll get used to that soon.”
A debut against 10-man St Johnstone at home was probably the ideal way to ease Cantwell into life as a Ranger but Kamara admits that going to Tynecastle to face Hearts on Wednesday is as tough as it gets. He said: “It’s a tight pitch and they’ll have a good crowd. But I think he’ll do well.
“Every game is a test for us. Everyone already has their eyes on us to see how well we are doing. It will be a tough game for us.
“But hopefully we can keep on putting in the kind of performances that we’ve had against them over there in recent games, We haven’t lost a game for a little while now and hopefully we can carry that on.”
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