Analysis Corner: Does Kenny Miller deserve a starting spot at Rangers?
Last updated 3rd Oct 2017
By Dougie Wright (@dougie_analysis)
At 37 years of age, Kenny Miller has recently found himself out of the Rangers’ first team. Subsequently, there has been a lot of talk over “bust ups”, “dressing room leaks” and a “Pravda-esque” PR war. However, this column will ignore all of that entirely and focus on the football argument: does Kenny Miller deserve a starting spot at Rangers?
A quick glance at the stats would say that he probably does. Miller has been involved in 5 goals for Rangers in 714 minutes of action. That works out at more than a goal every couple of games.
However, that’s the problem of just taking a quick look at the stats. Of the five goals Miller has been involved in, one was against Progres Niederkorn and three were in a 6-0 beat down of Dunfermline. All told, he’s only got one assist in the league, and that was three minutes into the first game against Motherwell.
Indeed, by the time Miller was eventually dropped, he had played in six league games without doing anything in front of goal.
Something wasn’t working, but it wasn’t necessarily Miller’s fault. Let’s take a look at how Rangers’ tactics have changed this season.
Tactical Issues
Most sides play with at least three midfielders reasonably centrally. Caixinha’s aim of playing 4-4-2 meant that there was room for a player to go wide on one wing, while the player on the other side stayed fairly close to the centre pairing of Dorrans and Jack.
This initially looked like a midfield with Niko Kranjcar on the left and Daniel Candeias on the right. However, Kranjcar was able to neither track back effectively, nor compensate for that by adding much to the team going forwards. This led to the Croatian being dropped for Josh Windass.
Windass is a player who likes to hug the touchline. With Candeias doing reasonably well on the other wing, Rangers suddenly found themselves playing with two wingers.
Remembering that most teams have three central players, Rangers’ switch to just two central players means that Dorrans and Jack are usually outnumbered by the opposition midfield. As such, they can’t really risk pushing forwards. When they do, they’re vulnerable to situations like this:
In order to prevent such situations, Caixinha had to sacrifice one of his strikers by bringing one of them further back.
Alfredo Morelos is the team’s main source of goals, so there’s no point forcing him into a deeper role. Therefore, the responsibility fell to Kenny Miller.
Square peg in a round hole?
Miller has had a 20 year career as a centre forward. He thrives on playing on the shoulder of the last man. You can expect some basic hold up play from him, but not much beyond that. With Rangers spending a significant amount of money on attacking midfielder Carlos Peña this summer, Miller’s place grew ever more wobbly with every passing game the 4-4-2 failed to deliver.
Could Miller find a way back into the team?
From a purely tactical point of view, you struggle to see a way for Miller to break his way back into this Rangers side. Caixinha cannot afford to play with two strikers just now, given the lack of depth in wide areas. If Miller had been contributing with goals and assists, then perhaps Caixinha may have persisted, but the Scotsman’s goalscoring output made his position expendable.
Whatever else happened off the pitch is a bit of a mystery. What’s clear is that this is a Rangers side with no real place for Kenny Miller.
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