Giovanni van Bronckhorst has made a good start to his Rangers managerial career as the former Dutch captain has managed to win six games with a 100% record. The defending Scottish Premiership champions have scored 12 goals and conceded only once in the six games played under the new manager.
The Dutch manager has improved the Rangers’ defense since his appointment. Rangers had three clean sheets in 13 games before his arrival. The team conceded 13 goals and averaged one goal per game. Since his arrival, the Rangers have kept five clean sheets in a row and only conceded one goal in six games. There is a decrease in the average goal-scored rate by the team, but a massive improvement in the defensive corner.
Rangers have the second-best defense in the Scottish Premiership. The team has conceded 14 goals and average less than one goal per match. The overall expected goal against rate of the team is 13.32. In these six matches, the xGA of the other teams combined was 4.96. The overall xGA averages 0.7 per match, and the average xGA in the last six matches was 0.82. Rangers had an xGA of 1.74 against Hearts but kept a clean sheet in the match.
The above viz shows the match overview of Rangers’ 2-0 victory over St. Johnstone. The match was a gameweek 14 fixture but was played after the gameweek 18th match. Rangers had the best duels win percentage in this match under van Bronckhorst. The Gers contested 60 defensive duels and won 71.7% of their duels. James Tavernier contested 17 duels in that match. He won four, lost six and his seven duels ended in a neutral result. The recoveries made were more than the opposition’s, and 30 recoveries were made inside the opposition’s half. The challenge intensity was also high for the home team, and most of the duels were won in the middle third.
Rangers have made the third-highest number of recoveries in the league this season. They made 1592 recoveries, and the team averages 83.7 recoveries per match. Rangers have made the second-highest recoveries in the opposition’s half. The defending champions have made 284 recoveries in the attacking third, 624 in the middle third and 684 recoveries in the defensive third. In the last six matches, the Rangers have made 459 recoveries, and average 76.5 recoveries per match.
Rangers have made a lot of improvements in defense, and the manager has concentrated on strengthening it. The average goals scored have decreased along with the average goals conceded. The manager will expect to keep more clean sheets and score more goals along with it to retain the league title once again.
