There isn’t much between Rangers and Celtic, however, there is one fundamental difference that sees them dominate domestically and has been a key factor in most of the goals that they have scored against us in the last two seasons.
Simply put, they commit more players to the box than us when they are attacking regardless of the game state and what the score is because they know that there is more chance of them getting the break of the ball or on the end of a cross or cut back if there are more bodies to aim at.
Michael Beale, at least, seems to be aware of this issue though and against Motherwell, it finally looked as if the message has been getting through as these images show.
Specifically, Ryan Kent and Todd Cantwell, who were picked out individually by the manager only last weekend, are exactly where you would want them to be when we have managed to get behind a defence.
With this many bodies in the box, the ball in doesn’t have to be perfect. Cantwell’s goal in particular is the perfect example of an opportunity that would be missed if we aren’t as brave, one of Liam Kelly’s reaction saves would fall to a Motherwell player eventually if he wasn’t swarmed by blue shirts.
Beale can tinker with formations and personnel but the fundamentals remain the same, we can play all the football in the world but if the final ball is being aimed at just one or two attackers against 7, 8 or 9 defenders then we will struggle to create the same quality of clear cut chances that should have seen us score a few more against Motherwell.
This is exactly the sort of progress we should be seeing, all we need to do now is stop conceding silly goals and learn how to deal with crosses….