Slavia Prague captain Jan Boril has hit out at Rangers’ aggressive approach during and after their dramatic 2-0 Europa League victory at Ibrox, speaking to iSport.
Steven Gerrard’s side certainly went down fighting.
But there’s a fine line between intensity and aggression and, at times, the newly crowned Scottish Premiership champions may have strayed over the line of acceptability last night.
Rangers ended the game with nine men after all – Leon Balogun punished with a second yellow card 12 minutes after Kemar Roofe saw a straight red following a collision that left Slavia goalkeeper Ondrej Kolar coated in blood and requiring stitches.
“We went into it with the idea we wanted to advance at all costs, and we succeeded,” left-back Boril said after Slavia became the first team to taste victory at Ibrox in more than a year.
“It hurt a lot. They kicked us a lot. They were very unpleasant.
“We knew they would go like this. We encouraged ourselves to concentrate.”
Centre-back Alexander Bah was left similarly unimpressed by the fired-up hosts.
“I’m quite subjective but it’s clear I obviously don’t think Rangers’ behaviour was right either. The first red card is probably the wildest tackle I have ever seen. It’s a shame Rangers were such bad losers,” he tells Bold.
Slavia coach Jindrich Trpisovsky, meanwhile, took aim at Roofe after the former Leeds striker clattered studs first into Kolar’s face on the hour mark.
“Twice they tried to intimidate him – a disaster,” Trpisovsky said.
The defeat was indeed a disaster for Rangers – but not necessarily a surprise.
Slavia proved against Leicester City in the round-of-32 they are capable of holding their own against top-quality opposition.
The Czech champions also gave Dortmund and Barcelona a scare in the Champions League last season, when Tomas Soucek and Vladimir Coufal were still wearing red and white.
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