Ex Sunderland ace backed after brutal Rangers error as he overcomes criticism to become 'excellent signing'

A former boss has backed one Rangers star following his weekend mishap.

Dan Neil played a costly pass that allowed Dundee to find their leveller during a 2-2 Premiership draw with Derek McInnes’ men on Saturday. The midfielder has shone since permanently leaving Sunderland for Rangers, scoring an Old Firm double, but his first trip to Dens Park proved a low moment.

Former Dundee boss Jim Duffy was looking over the action on Superscoreboard and reckons the ex Sunderland star deserves backing. He said: "I do think Neil has been very good, and you have to look at it over a concerted period of time. He got a bit of stick when he first came in, but those two goals against Celtic and his overall play.

Dan Neil at Rangers assessed

"I think he's been exceptional these past couple of months, but not to say that you're not allowed a mistake; it will happen occasionally. Overall, Neil's been an excellent signing for Rangers."

Rangers manager McInnes said of the game: "We corrected a few things at half-time, the speed of the pass to wide players, winning more duels and we defended much more confidently than we did in the first half.

"On the back of the first half, Dundee deservedly went in front. We knew ahead of the game that their forward players work the system really well and they would ask us questions, but for us in possession was the problem. Min-Su Kim had to play closer to Naderi, and we had to try and get our wide players isolated more with their full-backs and that means passing with a quicker tempo.

Derek McInnes on Dundee 2-2 Rangers

"Bouanani's goal before half-time is a top class finish and when we got him into those kind of situations like in the second half, Gassama and him tortured their full backs and got us up the pitch. It's a magnificent goal from Nico, but we had so many more chances, we need to make better decisions, we shouldn't need to score more than two goals to win a game of football.

"That 25 minutes of play, shows what the team is capable of, when we play in that manner we're a very good team. We've made a mistake for Dundee's equaliser and it was like a balloon popping and we then had to dig deep and go again, and we never quite managed to get to the same levels.

"It does feel like a missed opportunity, but in fairness to Dundee they were good value in the first half, it shows you why they are where they are in the league, but I was more concerned about what we needed to do against it, but we can't come away from home and have to score three goals to win a game. I feel Dundee have got a good thing going here, they have partnerships all over the pitch, a good balance about them, they will ask questions of teams, but we just needed to play with more speed in our possession game and get more support to Naderi first half.”

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