Ibrox View: Rangers winger Barker desperately needs to improve his finishing
Rangers manager Steven Gerrard continues to show faith in winger Brandon Barker.
The 23-year-old started his second consecutive Scottish Premiership match in the 2-0 win over Hamilton on Saturday, and in some ways this was probably his best performance of the season to date.
Barker’s pass completion rate of 88% was his highest of the campaign so far, while he also completed 100% of his crosses and had five successful dribbles out of an attempted six, as per Wyscout.
But there is still one part of his game that desperately needs improving.
Barker’s shot accuracy against the Accies was 0%, and over the course of the campaign he has hit the target just once from eight attempts.
His two efforts against Hamilton were particularly poor, albeit for different reasons.
His first attempt was a speculative shot on goal from quite some distance, and it could hardly have gone any worse.
Above is a picture of where Barker struck the ball from, and where it ended up.
It’s so bad that you could use it as the image in a spot the ball competition and nobody would ever guess correctly.
His technique was poor, his swing was wild, and the slice was always destined for Row Z.
That being said, his second attempt came from a much better opportunity, and he still squandered it.
After a bit of a goalmouth scramble, the ball falls fortuitously to Barker in a wonderful position.
He’s eight yards out or so, with a direct shot on goal.
Yes, there is pressure from the defender, but seemingly not enough to properly put him off – and yet he still manages to miss the target completely.
From that sort of range he has to be testing the keeper at the very least, but instead he fires his shot into the side netting.
It’s a shame too, because aside from his woeful finishing, this was a much improved display from Barker in a lot of ways.
If he can start to find the back of the net, he could be a decent asset for the Gers this term.
In other Rangers news, Leon Balogun has started life in Glasgow brilliantly.