Jason Jones

Fri 25 September 2020 20:30, UK

One of the biggest, and arguably most unforeseen, decisions that Steven Gerrard has had to face at Rangers this season is who to start in goal.

Allan McGregor has been his undisputed number one since year dot, but picked up a knock early on in the campaign and has found himself usurped by Jon McLaughlin.

The summer signing only conceded his first two goals of the season against Hibernian on Sunday, and has barely put a foot wrong otherwise.

But McGregor was given a chance to prove himself in the 4-0 Europa League win over Willem II on Thursday evening, and boy did he come out swinging.

The veteran stopper was in inspired form, drawing praise from the likes of Billy Dodds and Kevin Thomson, who hailed his “unbelievable” display.

And it’s easy to see why they were so bowled over.

Despite the scoreline, Willem II posted 15 shots on goal, five of which required saves from McGregor.

As a point of reference, McLaughlin has faced 1.76 shots per game, and has had to make 1.49 saves, as per Wyscout.

But this is less about quantity, and more about quality.

Willem II’s total xG against the Gers was 0.95, a notable jump from the xCG of 0.6 that McLaughlin has posted this season.

Really though, there were two saves that really caught the eye, and reiterated McGregor’s talents as a world class shot stopper.

In this position here, for instance, you would back the striker to bury this nine times out of 10.

What McGregor does superbly is spread himself and make himself as big as possible.

It reduces the target size considerably, and it challenges the forward to finish, rather than assuming that this is a foregone conclusion.

McGregor stands up just long enough to make the striker make a decision, then shows wonderful wrist strength to bat the ball away.

But even this save pales in comparison next to a stop he made in the second half.

This header is from three yards out, maybe even less than that.

There is no way that McGregor has any right whatsoever to even get a hand to it, let alone stop it from crossing the line.

Somehow – and we mean somehow, because this is bafflingly good – he manages to plunge backwards to block the shot, stopping it with inches to spare.

Maybe inches is overestimating it too, to be fair.

This is an absurd save, echoing Gordon Banks against Brazil or David Seaman against Sheffield United.

If that’s not enough, McGregor somehow gets a paw to the rebound too, parrying it away from behind the goal line.

If there was any doubt whatsoever that the 38-year-old is still the undisputed king of shot stopping at Ibrox, last night’s freakish masterclass has surely put them to bed.

In other Rangers news, Ibrox View: BBC pundit rant surely shows that Rangers player needs to fix up or face axe.