Did Rangers star ignore Graeme Murty?

There wasn’t a LOT of good in Rangers’ win over Hearts today – it was a better display than last weekend, but that would not be hard.

The players did do as this site suggested and seemed to up their level for the fans at least – albeit 150 Edmiston Drive was an absolute morgue in terms of atmosphere and the players had to create it themselves.

And to give them their due, while the quality of fare on display was patchy, there was no lack of effort from the home side and while we want our Rangers teams to be good, we critically ask at least that they try.

And they did a bit more today. And that got the fans going a lot more as the game advanced. Fans won’t just cheer for utter dross, and need to be inspired by what they see.

But this entry would like to focus on one performer who might not exactly have had his greatest day in a Rangers shirt, but it was certainly by far his best since returning from injury and he may have done it by mostly ignoring his manager.

Graham Dorrans might have been on the team sheet as partnering Jason Holt in defensive midfield, but the 30-year old more or less went with his own script and covered box to box, and as us fans have been screaming for, played far more to his own strengths than he has seemingly done since returning from his absence.

Quite honestly you could even argue it was a sign of disrespect to his manager that he basically elected to go forward and create way more than usual, because that is not what he’s been doing since he came back, and unless Murty dramatically changed his role today, he decided enough was enough and used the ball far better than he’s seemingly been allowed to do.

Time and time again he was picking out runners on either flank, with beautifully lofted balls which got behind the Hearts defence repeatedly. Admittedly many of these came to nothing such was the Gorgie side’s stubbornness in defence, but Dorrans was providing a lot of the ammo.

He also made plenty of inroads forward and found himself on the edge of the box plenty of times, which is the place he can do damage – and that is more like the player we signed.

It is hard to know what Dorrans’ best position truly is – he is creative, but not quick, he has vision, but not a lot of strength, and he can score, but he’s not often advanced enough to do it a lot.

But he has quality and intelligence – and a lot of both.

If we have done Murty a disservice and Dorrans was given license to roam, we retract the earlier sentiments – but whatever the cause, it was good to see a bit more of the Dorrans we know he can be.