Aberdeen 1- 2 Rangers: Bittersweet victory as Naismith stretchered off

McCoist could not disguise the extent of his concern over Naismith’s condition. The player sustained cruciate damage to his left knee in April 2008, an injury which sidelined him for nine months, and the signs yesterday were worryingly familiar.

“Steven feels the same pain and numbness he did with that previous injury,” said McCoist. “We won’t know for sure until he has a full scan and diagnosis, but it doesn’t look good. It absolutely puts a blemish on our day. I’ve spoken to him briefly and, as you would expect, he is in a bit of despair.”

Naismith was the architect of his own misfortune, initially picking up the injury with a bad foul on Rob Milsom which saw the Aberdeen player limp off to be replaced by Darren Mackie. Down for a lengthy spell of treatment, Naismith was fortunate to escape a booking from referee Willie Collum for the challenge. But the damage he had done to himself became apparent shortly after play restarted when he twisted the knee and crumpled to the turf with no Aberdeen player nearby.

Some Aberdeen supporters did themselves no credit by gleefully cheering Naismith’s misfortune, the Scotland international receiving sympathetic applause from others when he was carried off the pitch on a stretcher, clearly in considerable distress.

Second-half goals from Kyle Lafferty, who replaced Naismith, and Nikica Jelavic earned Rangers all three points, although there was an anxious finale when Allan McGregor blundered badly to allow Richard Foster to pull one back for the Dons. It is Rangers’ 14th consecutive away league victory, a run stretching back to last season and which now sees them on the verge of equalling the all-time club record of 15 set under Bill Struth back in 1928-29.

“I wasn’t aware of that,” said McCoist, “and to be honest all I’m thinking about is trying to win the next game. But we must be doing something right to come close to anything achieved by one of Mr Struth’s teams. I felt we reacted well in the second half today, played some great stuff and thoroughly deserved the win.”

Much of the first half was painful to watch, both teams expending most of their energy breaking up any attempt by their opponents to produce fluent, attacking football.

The home fans would take encouragement nonetheless that McGregor was the busier of the two goalkeepers during the opening 45 minutes, forced into two notable saves. He was almost deceived completely by a dipping and swerving shot struck with some venom from all of 35 yards by Kari Arnason in the tenth minute, McGregor managing to scoop the ball to his left before Carlos Bocanegra stepped in to clear the danger.

McGregor made a more impressive and convincing stop to deny Chris Clark from close range in the 32nd minute. When the ball broke to Mackie, he appealed for a penalty when he went down under Dorin Goian’s challenge. Aberdeen manager Craig Brown clearly felt it should have been given and received a touchline warning for his show of dissent from Collum.

The second half delivered far more palatable fare, and Rangers forced Aberdeen keeper David Gonzalez into his first save in the 52nd minute. The Colombian was quick to react as Jelavic raced on to Steven Whittaker’s through ball, blocking the Croatian’s close-range shot.

And Rangers took the lead with a well-executed goal six minutes later. Aberdeen were guilty of some hesitant defending, Yoel Mawene losing possession cheaply, but there was no doubting the quality of Steven Davis’ perfectly weighted through ball to Lafferty who steered a fine right-foot shot low across Gonzalez and into the right hand corner of the net.

Aberdeen replaced the struggling Fraser Fyvie with Mohamed Chalali but the momentum was now very much with Rangers who doubled their lead from the penalty spot in the 69th minute. Papac was felled by Mackie’s clumsy challenge, albeit the Aberdeen substitute seemed to get a touch on the ball. Jelavic made an emphatic job of converting.

With eight minutes remaining, McGregor reprised the kind of error which saw Badr El Kaddouri score against him for Celtic at Ibrox earlier this season. Although Foster’s long-range shot swerved, the keeper was horribly at fault as he fumbled the ball into the net.

Aberdeen were unable to seriously threaten an equaliser, their day ending in further dismay when Rory Fallon was shown a straight red card in stoppage time for a flailing elbow in the face of Goian.

“There’s absolutely no way it was deliberate,” said Aberdeen manager Brown.

“We will have a look at it again and may appeal. But the marginally better team won today. Rangers have an edge that is winning them a lot of games on the road.”