Rangers continue European adventure
Paul Le Guen will welcome the distraction of European competition
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Thursday, 14, Dec 2006 10:43
Rangers' fine European form continued to defy their domestic woes as they registered a 1-0 win over Partizan Belgrade to grab top spot in Uefa Cup Group A.
The Ibrox side might have expected that their already-eliminated opponents would ensure a gentle build-up to the weekend's Old Firm derby, but they had to work hard to extract a win from the tie.
An early penalty claim after Bojan Zajic appeared to bring down Thomas Buffel was given short shrift by referee Ruud Bossen and the home side would have been examining the replays very closely had Nenad Mirosavljevic not miscued his header at the other end.
As it was, the former Cadiz striker got himself horribly tangled up and wasted his side's best chance of the first 45 minutes.
Gavin Rae shook the woodwork for Paul le Guen's men after exchanging passes with Nacho Novo in the closest the Gers came to breaking the deadlock before heading back to the dressing rooms.
Whatever the former Lyon manager had to say to his troops seemed to have the desired effect and just ten minutes after the restart they were ahead.
Allan Hutton's diving header converted a tempting curling delivery from Novo to break the resistance of the Serbian visitors.
As they eased off, perhaps with one eye on Sunday's visit of Celtic, Rangers nearly found themselves dragged back to parity but for some wretched finishing.
Substitute Ljubisa Vukelja spurned a fine chance as he sent Mirosavljevic's cut-back crashing into the advertising hoardings instead of the net.
Allan McGregor was called on before the end as well, but in spite of a lacklustre finish Rangers made it to the final whistle with their noses in front.