Kai Watson: Rangers & Their Struggle for Goals
Scottish football expert and Rangers fan Kai Watson delivers his thoughts on Free Bets about the current state of his team, and this week, the focus is on goals, or lack of them.
Rangers spent around £8-10m, £3m and £5.5m on Youssef Chermiti, Bojan Miovski and Danilo respectively and between them, they have scored four goals in thirteen Scottish Premiership matches, a miserable return.
Although Danilo was purchased in the summer of 2023, the other two striking options were both this summer and have two goals between them for over £10m spent.
Since Danny Rohl took over, Rangers have scored eleven goals in nine games and their strikers have only scored three of those goals with Danilo scoring two and Chermiti scoring once.
They’ve really struggled to not only create chances but when they have managed to create some chances they haven’t been clinical in front of goal.
Rangers Goalscoring Stats
Here are some depressing stats for Rangers fans (league position in brackets);
- Goals Scored - 17 (7th)
- Goals Per Match - 1.30 (7th)
- xG - 16.8 (5th)
- Total Shots Per Game - 13.9 (3rd)
- Shots on Target Per Match - 4.90 (4th)
- Big Chances Created - 22 (8th)
- Big Chances Missed - 13 (10th)
That’s a sad indictment of where the club currently is and a massive concern to the current manager. There’s absolutely no creativity in the squad and that’s why, for big chances created, they rank eight in the table.
The only four teams that have created less big chances are Aberdeen (7th), St. Mirren (11th), Livingston (12th) and Dundee (9th). Although the first two will be disappointed with their seasons so far, they won’t be as disappointed as Rangers fans have been with their domestic performances.
Falkirk Game Shows Scoring Troubles Yet Again
Yesterday’s match against Falkirk was a prime example of the turgid performances that the club have been churning out domestically all season. If you asked fans to point out a good league performance, they would have to go back to last season where, again, Rangers didn’t end it spectacularly.
In the match against Falkirk, Rangers created three big chances (according to FotMob, although I wouldn’t count the Bajrami miss as a ‘big chance’).
However, the corner that falls to Thelo Aasgaard at the backpost has to result in a goal. The Norway international is clearly distracted by the defender in front of him and completely misjudges a low header that goes harmlessly wide.
The best chance of the game though fell to Djeidi Gassama. Some neat play down the right eventually led to the winger being played through, he calmly chopped back inside, set himself but still managed to hit his right footed shot at Scott Bain when the whole left side of the goal was open for him.
These types of chances haven’t come often this season for Rangers but when they have, they’ve struggled to score them. Three strikers with an incoming cost of over £15m and they have four league goals between them and James Tavernier AGAIN leads the way in the scoring charts.
Derek Cornelius, Emmanuel Fernandez and Max Aarons all have the same amount of goals as Bojan Miovski and Youssef Chermiti. If there is to be a title challenge then Danny Rohl needs to find a way of getting these players to create more chances and, when they do, be more clinical with them.
Is that possible with the current team or will reinforcements in January be needed before the change happens?
Latest Rangers Betting Odds
After their draw with Falkirk, betting sites have Rangers as the 11/2 second favourites to win the title this season.
Next up, a midweek trip to Dundee United on Wednesday.
