Rangers eventually saw off Fenerbahce doing things the hard way via a penalty shoot-out, however, history only remembers who made it through, not how it happened.
The scoreline didn’t really reflect what was another good performance against a good team, if anything, it typified what can happen when playing against top class international players – even half chances can prove costly.
Barry Ferguson might not be Rangers manager for long, but he can be proud of seeing off one of football’s finest ever tacticians, with the first leg in Istanbul completely outsmarting Jose Mourinho.
Ferguson showed that he isn’t afraid to make hard decisions with one of them in particular not going down well.
At half-time in extra-time, the Gers boss was looking for fresh legs and decided to replace the tiring Vaclav Cerny with Danilo, only for the Czechia international to show the sort of mentality that has been missing for a long time to leave his teammate fuming.
Danilo reacts as Barry Ferguson makes Rangers sub call
It was the sort of managerial call that could go either way.
Both teams were evenly matched and were capable of causing each other problems as shown over both of the ties.
Danilo, given the shape that Rangers were playing, was the obvious replacement for Cerny, who had covered a lot of ground, and could have made a difference for the final 15 minutes and in the penalty shoot-out.
It was the sort of decision that Philippe Clement would probably have looked at the performance data in terms of distance covered and high intensity sprints and hooked the Rangers No.18.
The TNT Sports footage caught Danilo venting his frustration after getting stripped and ready to go on only to be told to sit back down, but Ferguson won’t see it any other way than a player wanting to make an impact, rather than any act of petulence.
What is worrying, is that over the two legs, Danilo didn’t get on the pitch at all.
Is Danilo’s time at Rangers running out?
The 2023 £6m summer signing, he should be one of the first names on the team sheet.
Yes, the 25-year old hasn’t long returned to training and has been cursed by injury, but Rangers can’t be paying their third choice striker big wages to sit on the bench every week.
The two performances of Cyriel Dessers against Fenerbahce show the Jekyll and Hyde nature of his play, however, his numbers and consistency, in terms of availability, speak for themselves.
It is going to be an interesting summer for a variety of reasons, but it is a huge one for Danilo with the feeling that, after two seasons, it is make, or break, if he is still at the club when the window shuts that is.
