The four Rangers defensive pillars that are showing cracks and how to fix them

It was truly remarkable.

In comparison, from just 13 games, the Rangers rearguard has been breached 13 times, conceding a goal per game. Even more frustrating for Connor Goldson and co. is they have the third-best defensive record in the Scottish Premiership behind Hearts, who have conceded 12 and Celtic, who have let in nine goals thus far. To give some more context, Rangers have an xGA of 8.35 meaning that side of their game is underperforming by a considerable margin.

It has to be said, though, that those defensive issues aren’t being brushed under the carpet by the players. Speaking after the Brondby 1-1 draw, Goldson alluded to Rangers’ shortcomings suggesting:

"It's always hard when you're giving teams a leg up with a one-goal lead.”

Similar has plagued Rangers domestically as well.

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They have been behind in seven of their 13 league matches thus far, most recently on Sunday against Ross County. However, it is a trend that has to be bucked quickly if Rangers are to try and stretch their lead at the top of the table after this international break.

Usually, when teams are conceding a high number of goals it’s not uncommon for there to be repeat issues that occur in different passages of play which result in goals being conceded. In Rangers’ case there are four types of recurring error which have led to those 13 goals conceded.

Failure to track runners

If you looked back at last season, you would be able to see that when out of possession, Rangers' Achilles heel was the midfield’s inability to track a runner, coming from deep.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be a problem that has been remedied so far this campaign.

In game two, against Dundee Utd, Rangers lost the match 1-0 and it came from that old issue of the midfield not tracking Jamie Robson’s run, allowing him to get in behind the defence and fire past the helpless Jon McLaughlin.

Conversely, Dundee United had two shots on target and 33% of possession, but they were able to take advantage of Rangers’ set-up. Firstly, James Tavernier goes with Jamie Robson, allowing Adrian Sporle to drive inside, Steven Davis could make two moves to help Tavernier and Lundstram at this point: press Sporle or he could position himself to cut out the passing lane into Nicky Clark, but he does neither.

As a consequence, John Lundstram or James Tavernier have to track Jamie Robson all the way, yet neither of them take the responsibility - Lundstram switches off and Robson gets in behind to score.

It was a similar story when Motherwell pitched up at Ibrox. Rangers have the lead and they contrived to get caught again, as no one picked up Kaiyne Woolery, who was able to escape the attention of the Rangers defensive unit.

There is more than one mistake in the build-up to this goal. For example, Jack Simpson’s weak tackle and perhaps James Tavernier allowing Kevin van Veen the time and space on the touchline.

As the play develops, however, one man can see the full picture – Steven Davis. Earlier in the build-up, Davis is aware of Woolery’s deep position. Davis doesn’t try to negate that danger. Instead, he is more focused on Van Veen, who cannot impact on the play. As the image illustrates, when the ball breaks, Davis should be helping Barisic in this defensive phase. Barisic is off-balance and cannot put in a proper tackle, giving Woolery a free shot. Davis should have been more aware and should have not only gotten closer to Woolery but he should have been tracking his run from deep, especially as Davis has the responsibility of being Rangers’ deepest midfield player.

Three errors are made but one is consistent in the concession of goals in that early part of the season – the non-tracking of midfield runners.

Crosses into the box from open play – from the second phase of play

Moving on from the midfield, the defence has come under some criticism of late, both from the manager and the fans. However, Rangers have been sloppy at the back and have lost goals from situations in the second phases of play where they should be more alive to the danger that the opposition is posing.

It comes down to a combination of two actions that have not been carried out effectively: not stopping crosses at source and not getting the first contact in the box when they have already failed to achieve the first objective.

Ross County during the reverse fixture at Dingwall had 10 crosses, six of those were accurate. And, of course, one from Ben Paton led to the goal for the Staggies.

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Phase one: failure to stop the cross

The image below shows the set-up when County get onto the over-hit free-kick. James Tavernier doesn’t get out quick enough to close down Ross Callaghan. He is able to use the man on the run, Ben Paton, who again is not under enough pressure from Joe Aribo – who can see the danger but isn’t able to press quick enough to block the cross.

Phase two: losing first contact in the box

The image below is from the second phase. Rangers have a numerical advantage inside the box, but they do not get the first proper contact on the ball. Goldson is on his heels and then, Harry Clarke is able to capitalise on the deflection falling for County but for Rangers, they should be able to defend their box better and be alive to the danger. Leon Balogun allows Harry Clarke to get goalside here and he is punished, as Clarke scores.

Furthermore, a recurring situation took place in the 2-1 win against Hibs at Ibrox.

In phase one: Chris Cadden beats Borna Barisic for pace down Rangers’ left-hand side. Barisic is unable to stop the cross, as the image above shows. On this occasion, the Croat is beaten for pure speed and because of that factor, he is always second favourite in this particular duel.

In phase two, the issue of failing to get the initial contact on the cross came back to haunt Rangers. Hibs had nine crosses, three were successful, all from the aforementioned Cadden, but Rangers failed to deal with it. The image above shows Nesbit making space for himself, moving off the back of Lundstram. Rangers appear to have the right-back Patterson, the centre-back Goldson and Lundstram, standing in a line. Because of the positioning of the three players, and Lundstram getting caught under the ball, he is blocking Goldson, who is not at all ready to try and compete for the ball. All of those factors contribute to the goal being conceded, but most prevalent was the inability for Lundstram or Goldson to compete for or win the header.

Conceding from corners – defenders losing their men; could having a man on the post be a benefit?

Set-plays are so important in football but especially in the rough-and-tumble world of Scottish football, they tend to take on a greater significance.

Using logic, if you do not defend your box well at corners and lose your men, you will concede. Of the 13 goals Rangers have given up, three have come from corner kicks. One came courtesy of a goalkeeping error and two were examples of players losing their specific man. However, when the goals are broken down and the defenders are losing their man, ask yourself if having a man on the post would have potentially stopped the goal as part of the overall set-up.

The first goal Rangers conceded directly from a corner in the league was Scott Brown’s bullet header in the recent 2-2 draw at Ibrox.

Rangers are set up to man-mark. Alfredo Morelos who is the free player at the front post cannot affect the game as the ball is played towards the back post. Leon Balogun is being overloaded two-vs-one but as you can see Scott Brown gets a run on James Tavernier, and Christian Ramirez has the run on Goldson too. This enables Brown the space to bullet the header into the bottom corner. However, if Morelos had been given the man-on-the-post job, ala Steven Davis in previous years, would he have been able to clear the ball? Perhaps, but the first job is for Tavernier not to allow Brown to escape his clutches.

In the match after this one, the 6-1 mauling of Motherwell at Fir Park, similar happened. Rangers were famous for their attacking patterns last campaign, now they have infamous patterns of conceding so many similar types of goals on a weekly basis.

Rangers again, choose to man-mark and leave nobody on the posts. Leon Balogun, Tavernier and Joe Aribo lose their men in the centre of the image. Balogun’s man, Johansen gets his head to it, forcing McGregor to save. But if Rangers have a man on the back post, do Motherwell have the rebound opportunity when the ball comes out to Mugabi? If there is a man on the back post, then it’s highly probable that the ball would be cleared. However, you cannot mark as slackly as has been done in the image above and expect to keep clean sheets.

Poor pass choice

The final element of Rangers’ goal concession has been the individual choosing the wrong pass in the wrong area when a simpler, safer pass or option has been available to them. Both examples here contributed to a goal being given away very cheaply.

Christian Ramirez’s goal stands out. It has been the poorest goal Rangers have given away all season. But it comes from players making poor choices at critical times.

Rangers are going short as they normally would when building play from a goal-kick. They are brave and wish to play out despite Aberdeen pressing extremely high. Goldson has Johnny Hayes pressing him, leaving Tavernier free, which is where the ball should have gone and allowed Rangers to start an attack.

The choice of pass Goldson made was to Lundstram, who was being pressed by Hedges and his body shape was wrong to receive the ball. That leads to Lundstram being dispossessed and an Aberdeen goal being scored. But it could have been prevented if Goldson had either gone long or fed Tavernier on the right.

On Sunday it was Ianis Hagi who was guilty of choosing the difficult pass and being punished.

Hagi in the image above is being pressed. However, you can see Juninho Bacuna’s positioning. When Hagi initially receives the pass, Bacuna drops and gives Hagi the easy option to feed him the ball and start a Rangers attack. Hagi refusing the option and taking the extra touch inside gives him a problem – he’s got an overload disadvantage and then has to play a short pass to Lundstram which in turn allows Hungbo to complete his press. This leaves Lundstram on the back foot, and the result is a goal to the Steelmen.

Conclusion

To summarise, Rangers need to sharpen up their defending, that much is obvious, to everyone. However, something stuck when John Bennett, Rangers vice-chairman spoke about the four pillars of the business model at a club like Rangers.

Speaking to Rangers TV in December, he said: "Covid came out of nowhere and has knocked everything, has rocked everything and it has been very, very challenging.

"And yet, I sit here in a positive frame of mind. I think shareholders will have heard from others - Stewart [Robertson] in particular about the four pillars we talk about internally, and our business model is built on those four pillars."

That outlook can be transferred onto the park when we are discussing the team.

We now have witnessed the four defensive pillars that are showing cracks and if they aren’t fixed properly, the whole structure could crumble. The only way to keep those pillars standing is to eradicate the problems within them.

The old saying is very true, ‘Strikers win games, defences win titles.’ We will see in due course if this Rangers team can sharpen up and retain their title, they have shown they are very much capable of being watertight at the back, but as the season progresses the new manager, whoever he is, have to address the four issues mentioned above if they are to have a successful season.