How Rangers defeated the Livingston block with Ryan Kent's one-v-one dismarking

A fulfilment of the ‘tough place to go’ cliché given the surface and disciplined opposition, it took half-time tactical alterations for Rangers to eventually find a route beyond the low block in West Lothian.

The visitors conceded what Giovanni van Bronckhorst branded an “impossible” opener within five minutes. Thereafter, David Martindale’s side had 19 percent of possession to Rangers’ 81 and completed just 50 percent of their 180 passes as they played to protect for the following 85 minutes.

Nine men sat deep while Joel Nouble, who scored the opener, remained high and offered a target for long passes.

Nouble rarely applied pressure when Connor Goldson or John Souttar carried the ball out of defence. This allowed the hosts to mark up all remaining passing options.

Below, Rangers are forced to play around their opponents with every passing option, aside from Goldson and Souttar, occupied.

Notice that Livingston are happy to allow Rangers' centre-back pairing possession and close off passing options, resulting in a free man to offer cover.

“It took us out of the game a little bit,” van Bronckhorst said, referring to his side’s early concession.

“Especially with our formation in possession, the speed of passing. We didn’t attack the right spaces in the right moments, we didn’t switch play as good as we normally do.”

Rangers were unable to create chances in the first half. Of their seven shots which combined to record 0.23xG (expected goals), six were from outside the box. Because their centre-backs weren’t attracting pressure, and play wasn’t moving quickly enough to exploit any gaps, possession was laboured, slow and ultimately, comfortable for the opposition.

The first-half pass map resembles a dreaded U-shape. Possession went around the block, rather than penetrating through any valuable centre ground.

Isolating passes in the final third alone reaffirms this judgement. Livingston managed to funnel every spell of possession wide, just where they wanted it.

The pass network from the opening 45 minutes shows that the visitor's back four and defensive midfielder John Lundstram held the majority of the ball, as revealed by the larger circle size. Full-backs and wingers played on the same line, allowing Livingston to double up, while Antonio Colak was completely isolated.

The below passage of play encapsulates all the problems Rangers experienced prior to the interval.

Souttar attracts the attention of Stephane Omeonga, allowing Tom Lawrence a rare, unmarked moment in front of the defence.

The defender finds Barisic who, unable to punch the ball inside first time with his right foot, sees the central pocket closed up and instead plays the ball down the line to Ryan Kent.

Beacuse Barisic is playing on the same vertical line as his winger, Scott Pittman can join Nicky Devlin to force Rangers down the outside and double up on Kent.

On this very rare occasion, Kent manages to chop back onto his right foot. However, his shot is far too ambitious from a restricted angle and sails over the bar.

The winger was regularly doubled up on, with Barisic’s movement only dragging in his man, Pittman, to support Devlin rather than freeing up his teammate. 

To summarise, in the first half Rangers went around the block, lacking a player who could take the ball to feet centrally and go through Livingston.

Their wing play on the left was stale. The runs Barisic made allowed Pittman to drop next to Devlin and force Kent onto his left foot, preventing the Englishman from jinking inside and hitting an inswinging, right-footed delivery.

Van Bronckhorst introduced Malik Tillman at half-time, to address the first issue experienced before the break.

“We changed our set-up to get Antonio [Colak] a bit more support in the middle and had 45 minutes of one-way traffic,” he said.

Tillman’s impact was significant, but equally important was the formation alteration that saw Rangers improve their threat from out wide as well as the quality of delivery.

“The boys executed our game plan very well and limited Rangers to very little. In the second half, they got a wee bit more width in the game and started whipping balls into the box, we got lucky on a few occasions,” Martindale said post-match.

But how did Rangers get “more width” in such congested space?

Van Bronckhorst brought Barisic slightly infield and played Lawrence alongside Tillman behind Colak, leaving Tavernier to occupy the right flank and Kent the left.

This increased central bodies to penetrate the block and attack the box while, crucially, also taking Livingston players away from the previously congested wings, allowing Kent to deliver two moments of magic.

By inverting Barisic ever so slightly, Pittman was dragged away from the wing and no longer able to double up on Kent with Devlin.

The first moment of quality, by Martindale’s admission an occasion in which his side got lucky, saw Barisic attract the pressure of Pittman and quickly find Kent, now able to attack his man one-v-one in space.

Kent has room to deliver a perfect cross that is converted by Colak, although the header was wrongly adjudged to have been offside.

The same pattern repeats 10 minutes later and this time, Kent’s delivery is converted. Again, the winger is one-v-one because Barisic is passing to him from inside the pitch, having taken his man, this time Omeonga, with him.

Kent attacks Devlin one-v-one, and cuts back to deliver a right-footed inswinger from the position Pittman would’ve occupied in the first half, as highlighted in red.

His final ball is on the money, as is Scott Arfield’s front-post run.

“Scott [Arfield] comes on whose midfield runs are incredible,” Martindale said.

“We were in the middle of changing our shape to deal with that to a 5-4-1 and get three centre-halves between the sticks to deal with crossed balls. It’s probably the first time Kent’s cut back onto his right foot and put an inswinger in as opposed to an outswinger with his left and Scotty scores.”

Rangers seized the momentum and added a second soon after. Below, Tillman, who added presence and quality in the middle, wins a header, Lawrence plays forward and Colak wins a free-kick that Tavernier will convert.

After coming on at half-time, Tillman received in central pockets as demonstrated by the pass network above, allowing his team to move the Livingston block by committing markers and opening up gaps. He also won 83 percent of his aerial duels, which proved decisive as Rangers scored their winner.

Even more vital was the structural change at the break that disrupted Livingston’s control. By clearing room on the wing and populating the centre, Rangers worked space to manoeuvre chances and occupied the positions to convert them.