By David Herd
Ayr United first played in the Scottish Cup in 1912, but incredibly, today was the first time they had ever been drawn to play at Ibrox in the competition. Every previous meeting between the clubs had taken place at Somerset Park, apart from the 1973 and 2000 semi-final meetings at Hampden. In those 112 years, the Ayrshire team have played a Scottish Cup tie at the home of Scotland’s premier club, but the opposition was Airdrie who defeated them in 1924 at neutral Ibrox in a replay after the sides had drawn at both their home grounds.
But while history is interesting to some, it’s the present day that matters to everyone. And in 2024, today was all about Rangers getting safely into the quarter-finals and continuing their positive momentum as a surprise assault on the domestic treble gathers more steam. There was also the small matter of an opposition manager whose classless career at Parkhead earned him the role of pantomime villain for the day, the vast majority of the impressive 43,454 crowd hoping to see Scott Brown humiliated with plenty goals.
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Philippe Clement is not a man to let such emotions get in the way of doing what is best for his team. Scott Brown is no more important to him than any previous Ayr United manager, and his Friday press conference seemed to suggest this match against Championship opposition would allow him the chance to give match minutes to a few players with little game time recently, and to further integrate his recent signings into the first team. The vital win in midweek over Aberdeen had seen a harsh red card to Dujon Sterling, with the SFA unsurprisingly backing referee Don Robertson despite most neutral observers feeling a caution was the appropriate punishment. Sterling was therefore unavailable through suspension, robbing him of a first start since his left wing experiment at Paisley.
With the teatime kick-off time, it was nearly 4:30pm before we found out just how different the starting eleven would be. In the end, the manager decided on seven changes from the side who started against Aberdeen. One change he didn’t make was retaining Jack Butland in goal, with Super Jack joined by defensive colleagues Tavernier, Goldson and Souttar from the Aberdeen line-up. The seven new men were Barisic, Jack, Raskin, Diomande, Cortes, Wright and Silva with all but Tom Lawrence from Tuesday night available from the bench, alongside the returning Ben Davies. In the visiting line-up there weas a familiar face, winger Jamie Murphy who saw his dream move to Ibrox ruined by a bad injury on the plastic pitch of Ayr’s local rivals. Another winger on their bench, Aiden McGeady, added to the cast of villains in their dressing room.
It might have been titles and trebles that the fans talked about in recent times, but there was another impressive trophy on display in the first half – an Oscar. New signing Oscar Cortes was the most impressive player on the pitch in the opening half, looking a constant threat and involved in everything positive that Rangers created. It all started in the very first minute, the Colombian hitting the post with a low shot from the edge of the box. He had the first attempt on target a few minutes later with a shot that stung the palms of goalkeeper Robbie Mutch, before being instrumental in the breakthrough in the tenth minute. Scott Wright freed the winger down the left, and although the initial danger was blocked, Cortes set up Borna Barisic to fire into the new low past Mutch.
It was the start the home fans wanted, and it took their minds of serenading their hate figure for the afternoon. Not Scott Brown, but referee Willie Collum, who was the target of the Rangers fan anger from the first whistle. The official didn’t make himself any more popular when he booked Fabio Silva for an innocuous foul, before flashing two more yellow cards before half-time to Ayr players Roy Silva (for a blatant shirt pull on Mohamed Diomande) and Mark McKenzie for a late tackle on Connor Goldson.
And despite enjoying the vast share of possession, that goal was still all that separated the teams at half-time, with the closest to a second goal coming near the interval when Mutch produced a brilliant point-blank save from another Barisic effort which took a wicked deflection. The visitors were stuffy and committed, with their only chance in the opening 45 minutes was created by Connor Goldson when he lost possession to allow a three-on-three break towards the Rangers goal. John Souttar bailed out his partner with an excellent tackle. With just the one goal between the teams, no doubt it was Scott Brown who would have been the happier manager as the teams left the pitch.
The second half saw early controversy when Silva caught a defender with a slightly late challenge, and Mr Collum came under pressure from the Ayr players to show him a second yellow. Even Willie couldn’t justify that, and a free kick was the only punishment. Rangers were struggling now to kill the game off, with good chances for Ryan Jack and Barisic coming to nothing. There was then one of the biggest cheers of the day when the next yellow card was flashed, with the recipient being the Ayr manager.
His team’s goal had a narrow escape when acrobatic efforts from Diomande and Cortes were both cleared off the line, which prompted mass changes from the Rangers boss. One of the men replaced was Cortes, who had done enough in an hour to later be named Man of the Match. One of the replacements was Todd Cantwell, and he inspired Rangers to finally put the game to bed, his wicked chip across goal seeing Matondo somehow miss before Silva lashed the ball home. A brief VAR check for handball gave Ayr hope, but the goal stood and the game was over.
2-0 would be how the game ended, with Rangers doing more than enough to reach the quarter-finals, and Ayr looking happy that they avoided any embarrassment and acquitted themselves well. With game time for Diomande, another goal for Silva, and an excellent display from Cortes, it was a day for the January arrivals to show they will have a part to play in the season run-in.
The managers, unsurprisingly, chose to focus on different things. Brown showed that a decade of paranoia is hard to shake off, deciding to accuse the referee of failing to stand up to the pressure of Ibrox and send off Silva. “The goal was scored by a player who shouldn’t have been on the pitch” was the line he wanted the press to take away. Philippe Clement, was quick to dismiss any notion of Silva being lucky, he pointed out that his player had actually been fouled and that if he had thought Silva lucky to be on the pitch he would have substituted him.
When asked whether the fans are right to dream of a glorious season, he praised the size of the attendance and stated that he wants the fans to keep dreaming, while he and the players keep their focus on each game. They would not be asked to win by three goals in midweek to go top of the table, they want to win by many goals every game! His one frustration was not winning this one by more.
The Scottish Cup is still very much there to win, league title 56 would be incredible. Today, we saw an Oscar winning winger who can play his supporting role in our dreams of glory becoming reality.