Lee McCulloch believes the Umar Sadiq criticism has been totally over the top over the last 36 hours.
The third-choice striker seems to have become the whipping boy after Sunday’s loss to Aberdeen. He now infamously dived towards the end of the contest as he ran in on goal. It appears that moment is starting to define him as it continuously gets brought up.
Rangers as a collective unit weren’t good enough at Hampden on Sunday. It appears, however, as if Sadiq is the man many fans are pointing their fingers at for his ineptitude.
McCulloch, however, has come to the striker’s aid in his exclusive Evening Times column. The former Rangers title-winner believed the Nigerian forward, in truth, actually performed to a reasonable standard.
“I fully expect that everyone will be jumping on the bandwagon now to criticise Umar Sadiq after his performance at Hampden against Aberdeen, but in the circumstances, I think people should give the lad a break. I actually thought he did ok, especially in the first-half.
“As a team, Rangers aren’t the finished article, and Sadiq too is obviously a work in progress. He might not be the easiest on the eye and he certainly has to work on the timing of his runs in behind to avoid being caught offside so much, but I saw glimpses from his performance that suggested there may be a player in there somewhere.
“So, I hope that people don’t write him off after one game, particularly as he has hardly seen a lot of game-time. It was a hell of a match to be thrown into, so I’m prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt, and hopefully the fans will too.”
Some sense to the Sadiq debate
McCulloch has added some sense to the debate on Rangers’ Nigerian forward. He wasn’t by any means terrific at Hampden on Sunday. He was, however, nowhere near as bad as some like to believe.
If he had slotted his effort past Joe Lewis instead of diving, nobody would be criticising him. If Rangers had netted during their periods of dominance and won 1-0, he would probably have been praised.
Instead he’ll only be remembered for a terrible decision to throw himself to the deck. The silly decision by the front-man took away any chance he had for fans to think of the good points of his performance. He only has himself to blame in that respect.
As McCulloch states, Sadiq held the ball up extremely well in the first half. He brought others into play and gave Scott McKenna and Michael Devlin some problems. James Tavernier also described his teammate as a handful for the Dons, and that’s a fair assessment.
It’s a shame how things worked out for Sadiq, but hopefully he can somehow bounce back from his Hampden horror moment.
