Lewis Mayo continues to go from strength to strength since leaving Rangers with a stand-out display during Kilmarnock’s 2-0 Scottish Premiership victory over Aberdeen this weekend.
Killie boss Derek McInnes, following a win over his old employers, was keen to point out that he doesn’t tend to make a habit of singling out individual performances.
It is testament to just how impressive Lewis Mayo was this weekend, then, that McInnes felt the need to break from his own personal tradition.
Mayo left Rangers for Rugby Park in July, moving to Ayrshire for an as-yet undisclosed fee. It is understood that Kilmarnock invested a six-figure sum in the young defender, and that investment is already paying dividends with the 23-year-old one of the first names on McInnes’ team sheet.
Former Rangers defender Lewis Mayo shines at Kilmarnock
“It was a good performance with strong individual performances,” said a manager once on Rangers’ radar, speaking to the Daily Record with Kilmarnock deepening the Dons’ gloom following that European collapse against PAOK.
“I don’t normally like singling boys out, but Lewis Mayo was so good. Especially three versus three which was a big test for us.
“We were playing a good team who keep you honest. They have a lot of good players.”
‘So good’
Scotland U21 international Mayo did not make a single league appearance for Rangers but is closing in on 50 already for Killie, signing permanently over the summer after an impressive loan spell in 2022/23.
Mayo’s former employers, meanwhile, picked up three hard points over their own this weekend. Stoppage time goals from James Tavernier and Danilo turned a 1-0 deficit into a 2-1 victory in the blinking of an eye against Hearts, all the while maintaining Philippe Clement’s unbeaten start to life at Ibrox.
“The emotions are that I am really happy,” Clement tells Rangers Review.
“Clearly, they had the reaction that I wanted. I spoke about that with them. Our strength needs to be that, whatever happens in football, we never give up and we keep on repeating what we are doing because they are doing already good things together.
“Of course, we need to (be) better a lot of details. But, if we show the right mentality over and over again in every action, and in the reaction afterwards, then we are a really good team. That is what we showed together. Not with eleven but with the whole squad.
“Was it perfect? No. But, for me, it is a reference game in the way that they have seen (that), if they never give, up a lot of good things can happen.”
