was one with which the Cup Holders can have little
complaint – the game ebbing and flowing on a night of
high drama. In the inevitable post mortem that will no
doubt follow, questions will surely be asked of a team
selection that excluded the consistent Henning Berg
and of substitutions that deprived Rangers of two of
their most influential players, namely Mikel Arteta
and Ronald De Boer, for all of fifty minutes.
Manager Alex McLeish made five changes from Sunday’s
line-up with Maurice Ross, Craig Moore, Mikel Arteta,
Shota Arveladze and Ronald De Boer replacing Zurab
Khizanishvili (surprisingly on the bench), Henning
Berg (astonishingly left out altogether), Hamed
Namouchi, Peter Lovenkrands and Nuno Capucho.
The game kicked off in teeming rain, and the Cup
Holders almost made a sensational start in the opening
minute when a Maurice Ross cutback found Michael Mols
who missed an absolute sitter, firing over the bar.
Rangers were in control, comfortable in possession,
yet once again lacking the vital cutting edge.
Nevertheless the Ibrox men were presented with a clear
opportunity to open the scoring in 28 minutes when
Ronald De Boer, moving on to a Fernando Ricksen pass,
was upended by Hibs’ goalkeeper Daniel Andersson, only
for Mikel Arteta’s penalty to be saved by the Swedish
‘keeper.
The Edinburgh side were certainly not here to simply
make up the numbers, having tested Stefan Klos with
dangerous inswinging corner kicks, and it took a
superb sliding tackle by Frank De Boer to rob Garry
O’Connor as the forward homed in on goal.
Rangers snatched the lead in 39 minutes when a flowing
move involving Shota Arveladze and Maurice Ross saw
the Scot slot a slide-rule pass into the path of Mols
who rifled the ball home.
Hibernian restarted on the offensive, a Derek Riordan
back-heel finding O’Connor whose effort was held by
Klos in 48 minutes.
Rangers were creating the greater number of chances –
Arteta shooting wide four minutes later from eighteen
yards after Christian Nerlinger’s cross had been
headed into his path by Mols, then an Arveladze angled
drive from an Arteta pass flashed over in 56 minutes.
Arteta should have wrapped the tie up on the hour only
to shoot wide from a Ross cross with the goal at his
mercy.
It was all Rangers at this stage – eight minutes later
Ricksen’s slide-rule pass found Mols whose drive was
blocked, the rebound falling to Ross who saw his
angled drive held by Andersson.
A double substitution by Alex McLeish in 72 minutes,
replacing both Mikel Arteta and Ronald De Boer with
Zurab Khizanishvili and Egil Ostenstad, indicated
either that he believed the tie to be won or that both
players had nothing left to offer fitness-wise, yet it
was a substitution by Bobby Williamson three minutes
later that would ultimately turn the game, introducing
former Ranger Stephen Dobbie in place of Roland Edge.
Dobbie it was who levelled matters when he drove home
a Riordan pass, and suddenly it was an entirely
different game.
Rangers were on the rack in the closing stages,
hanging on the ropes as Hibs went for the kill.
Riordan might have won it, but headed over a McManus
cross, yet at the very death Ostenstad saw his drive
from a Vanoli cross blocked.
Paulo Vanoli had replaced the injured Maurice Ross in
87 minutes, and extra-time it was, with Hibernian
perhaps the favourites, the younger team arguably more
able to survive the test of stamina.
Nevertheless Rangers appeared to find a second wind in
the extra period, Craig Moore wasting a glorious
opportunity in 106 minutes when he beat the offside
trap to collect a Ricksen chip only for his cross to
be a complete miss-hit.
Four minutes later it was Moore again – his volley
from a Nerlinger corner being cleared off the line by
that man Dobbie.
In the dying seconds a Vanoli cross found Ostenstad
only for the Norwegian misfit to scoop the ball over
the bar.
Penalties it was, and when both Arveladze and Ball
failed with the first two for Rangers, the exit door
beckoned. Shota’s effort, the third miss out of three
the Georgian has suffered in a blue jersey, was wild,
high and wide, yet when Klos saved from both Dobbie
and O’Connor, Moore played a Captain’s part by
levelling matters. Brown, Nerlinger, McManus and
Vanoli kept it all square and when Doumbe hit the bar
Khizanishvili had the chance to put Rangers in the
final only to see Andersson turn his effort onto the
bar.
Murdock made it 4-3, and almost inevitably Frank De
Boer – the villain of the piece for Holland at EURO
2000 – hit the post to complete a night of misery for
Rangers.
Alex McLeish afterwards reflected:
“We should have had the game won. It should have been
over by half-time. We shared the goals around last
season, but now we can’t put the ball in the net. We
missed a penalty, missed two great chances. I doubted
whether some of our players would survive extra-time.
Now we have to show character on Sunday.”
The entire season will be at stake at Kilmarnock.
HIBERNIAN Andersson, Caldwell, Doumbe, Murdock, Edge
(Dobbie 75); Brown, Reid (McManus 45), Wiss (Whittaker
56), Thomson; Riordan, O’Connor
UNUSED SUBS Nicol, Brown
RANGERS Klos; Ross (Vanoli 87), Moore, F. De Boer,
Ball; Ricksen, Arteta (Khizanishvili 72), Nerlinger,
Arveladze; R. De Boer (Ostenstad 72), Mols
UNUSED SUBS Capucho, McGregor
REFEREE Kenny Clark