Steven Gerrard quietly and carefully accused Motherwell of timewasting after it was revealed the ball only spent 37 minutes of 90 in active use on the field of play in that fixture.
The multiball system, so commonly seen at Ibrox these days, aids quicker restoration of the ball in play, but not every club uses it and Motherwell used their own timewasting tactics to try and break the flow of the game up.
Which is, of course, their right to do, as long as they stay in the laws of the game, but it’s not terribly pleasant to witness, and of course manager Graham Alexander himself indulged in a spot too.
Gerrard was cryptic in his wording, but did say if other teams or managers wish to do what they do, that’s up to them, but Rangers will not time waste and will not use any tactics to slow matches down because we ‘want to play football’.
In truth, lesser teams will always resort to this, hell Rangers have done it against big European sides to run clocks down, and that’s not something we’ll judge negatively.
But it does happen, and it’s fair to call it out as being ‘a thing’, and Stevie wasn’t shy in hinting that Motherwell (and others) partook in doing so.
37 minutes of actual play in 90 minutes is actually a shocking statistic. Maybe it’s time the likes of FIFA and UEFA seriously looked at what action can be taken because it’s ruining the game. I even saw Chelsea parking the bus at home to Man City yesterday. Yes Chelsea the Champions of Europe! How about something radical like 40 minutes each way but the clock stops when the ball is not in play. Or we could get really radical and score a second goal in these games to remove the option of wasting time.
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