McGrogan
Kinnear 20
Thomson 25
Reid 89
Missed Penalties
B McPhail pen miss
Match Information
Attendance: 18,000
Referee: J.M. Martin (Fife)
Matchday: Saturday
Match Trivia
It would be idle to rad anything significant into this result. It conveys no message of a Killie revival or of a Rangers decline. The simple facts are that Rangers were disorganised for half the game through the retiral of Gray through injury and reduced to struggling units. Grays absence caused the withdrawal of Scott Symon to right back, though he has little pretensions as a defender pure and simple, while a youngster, like Waddell was left to work the right wing himself. In such circumstances, Rangers did wonderfully well to pull level midway in the second half. This goal was the highlight of the game and revealed the genius of McPhail at its best. Waddell stubbed the ground in making a short pass to McPhail, who pounced on the ball, and from midfield dribbled his way past two defenders to goal. The effort seemed to exhaust him, for his finishing shot was weak. Milloy dashed across and intercepted it, but the rebound went to Kinnear, who crowned an inspired movement. McPhail had made a poor job of a penalty kick in the first half, shooting little more than a keeper at Hunter, but this was forgotten and forgiven in his memorable break-through. Killie caused their supporters more anxiety than was necessary before making the points safe. Instead of spreading the play and taking advantage of their numerical superiority, they became all hot and bothered in attack, and were too agitated to make or take chances. There was still that odd chance of Rangers equalising again until half a minute from the finish, and that illustrated better than anything else the fight Rangers made with badly depleted forces and takes some of the gloss off Killies victory. Only the first half will stand criticism. Play after the interval was little more than a scramble, and free kicks were far more plentiful than good play. Killie led at half-time by the only goal, but a draw would have been a better reflex. Still, it showed that Killie were not entirely indebted to Grays misfortune for victory and were capable of making a fight of it when thigs were equal. This goal was well out of the ordinary. Drysdale, with a mighty throw-on placed the ball inside the penalty line, where Reid headed on to McGrogan. The left winger was poaching for such a chance and drove the ball home with his right foot. That was in eighteen minutes a grand goal. Five minutes after Rangers second-half equaliser Killie regained the lead. A cross-shot from McAvoy came down off the bar, and Thomson pushed the ball through. Reids late goal crowned a good days work for the big fellow, who engineered it and took the return pass to shoot through in his stride. Wyllie had a successful debut and bothered Rangers defence a lot. The return of McAvoy proved beneficial, but neither Thomson nor McGrogan on the wings gave the proper response, and Thomson was too often out of position. In the first half Hunter was conspicuous in Killies goal, his judgment never being at fault. Simpson was number one for Rangers, no doubt about that. None of his mates was so outstanding, but they had some good collective attacking spells. The Referee brought out the wrath of the home crowd by penalising Killie so often, but his close-up view of the play probably justified his decisions, and he was instant in making up his mind. McPhail missed a first half penalty
