The Borna Barisic Rangers dressing room acceptance fuelling left-back's standout displays
The 26-year-old looked certain to flop at the start of this season but has improved dramatically in recent weeks
By
Scott McDermott
It’s been a remarkable turnaround for Barisic. At Kilmarnock, on the opening day of the campaign, his confidence looked shot to pieces. He was bombed out of Gerrard’s line-up for three weeks, with Jon Flanagan in to replace him. But on August 25, against St Mirren, he was brought back in – and earned Rangers three vital points with a stunning free-kick winner. The 26-year-old hasn’t looked back since. That was a turning point and Barisic is now showing the kind of power and quality of delivery that enticed the Ibrox club to splash £2million on him. Gerrard was worried about his player a few months back, same as he would be with any top player badly out of form.
But he believes the Croat has responded to a bit of tender loving care from his Rangers team-mates and is right back on the pace. Barisic will be a key man in Gers’ Europa clash with FC Porto on Thursday night and the manager said:
“With Borna, it’s been a dressing-room thing. He’s feeling more comfortable in there now. The players are showing him more love. His confidence is coming from within that dressing-room and his training performances.
“He’s just gone to another level.
“I’ve always known that level was there with Borna. When recruiting him, we watched him a lot.
“And we obviously saw him first hand in our games with Osijek.
“But we’ve seen it before with players coming from other countries – some take longer than others to settle and really feel at home.
“He’s in a fantastic place right now but deserves the credit because he’s the one who has pushed himself.
“The penny has dropped in terms of what we want from him. And he deserves all the praise because he’s been really consistent.
“Was I worried about him? I worry about all of my players when they’re not in the form they can be.
“When they’re not performing at the level, you’re concerned for them.
“And when you’ve got a top player who is off where he should be – it’s really noticeable.
“But looking at his last six to eight performances, that’s Borna.
“He’s an international left-back, Croatia’s top pick for his position and you see how confident he is, competing with the likes of Bale.
“My job is to keep pushing to find that – and that’s what I did.
“There have probably been days when he’s not been happy with me. But I knew that form was there, it was just a case of getting it out of him and now keeping it there.”
Gerrard is a modern-day coach but he has an old-school streak that might seem alien to certain players of this generation. While the rest of the Rangers players was putting an arm around Barisic, the Ibrox gaffer admits that brutal honesty has also triggered a positive reaction. He said:
“Sometimes I’ve got to provoke players. I’ve got to tell them something they’ve not heard before or aren’t comfortable hearing.
“That’s my job. It doesn’t make me think any less of them because I love all the players the same.
“But I know from being a player myself that sometimes it takes a coach to say something you really don’t want to hear.
“That helps get you on the path back to where you should be.
“I’ve got loads of examples from my own career – from Rafa Benitez, Roy Evans, Ronnie Moran, Sammy Lee, Phil Thompson at Liverpool, the list goes on!
“Sometimes you just need to be told the truth. I’ve had really honest conversations with Borna and he knew it himself.
“I’m sure he’ll be the first to admit that his form was now where it should be.
“He’ll look back at those chats now and know why we had to have them.
“Certain players are mollycoddled now but I don’t do that with any player here. The key is communication.
“And Borna’s a fighter. Every Croatian player I’ve ever played with or managed, is a fighter.
“Look at Niko Katic, he’s up for the fight. But these boys are away from home for the first time, that’s the reality of it.
“And where they’ve come from, the demand and expectation that’s here at Rangers, wasn’t there.”
Barisic has played his part in making Gerrard’s side more defensively solid this season. In fact, he now holds the record for the lowest average of goals conceded per game at 0.68. That’s better than the likes of Graeme Souness, Walter Smith, Dick Advocaat and Alex McLeish before him. Gerrard says they had to tighten up from a year ago and believes they’ve achieved that.
He said:“We looked at the defensive record last year because we conceded too many goals.
“It was an area we wanted to improve and that’s the reason we decided to go with four quality centre-backs.
“They’re all slugging out for those positions now in defence.
“That’s the base that we need to build success on. Allan McGregor has also in great form.
“From a defensive organisation point of view, we are where we want to be.
“We’ve had some individual errors that have been costly but, in the main, we are defending well.”
The 26-year-old looked certain to flop at the start of this season but has improved dramatically in recent weeks
By
Scott McDermott
- 06:00, 20 OCT 2019
It’s been a remarkable turnaround for Barisic. At Kilmarnock, on the opening day of the campaign, his confidence looked shot to pieces. He was bombed out of Gerrard’s line-up for three weeks, with Jon Flanagan in to replace him. But on August 25, against St Mirren, he was brought back in – and earned Rangers three vital points with a stunning free-kick winner. The 26-year-old hasn’t looked back since. That was a turning point and Barisic is now showing the kind of power and quality of delivery that enticed the Ibrox club to splash £2million on him. Gerrard was worried about his player a few months back, same as he would be with any top player badly out of form.
But he believes the Croat has responded to a bit of tender loving care from his Rangers team-mates and is right back on the pace. Barisic will be a key man in Gers’ Europa clash with FC Porto on Thursday night and the manager said:
“With Borna, it’s been a dressing-room thing. He’s feeling more comfortable in there now. The players are showing him more love. His confidence is coming from within that dressing-room and his training performances.
“He’s just gone to another level.
“I’ve always known that level was there with Borna. When recruiting him, we watched him a lot.
“And we obviously saw him first hand in our games with Osijek.
“But we’ve seen it before with players coming from other countries – some take longer than others to settle and really feel at home.
“He’s in a fantastic place right now but deserves the credit because he’s the one who has pushed himself.
“The penny has dropped in terms of what we want from him. And he deserves all the praise because he’s been really consistent.
“Was I worried about him? I worry about all of my players when they’re not in the form they can be.
“When they’re not performing at the level, you’re concerned for them.
“And when you’ve got a top player who is off where he should be – it’s really noticeable.
“But looking at his last six to eight performances, that’s Borna.
“He’s an international left-back, Croatia’s top pick for his position and you see how confident he is, competing with the likes of Bale.
“My job is to keep pushing to find that – and that’s what I did.
“There have probably been days when he’s not been happy with me. But I knew that form was there, it was just a case of getting it out of him and now keeping it there.”
Gerrard is a modern-day coach but he has an old-school streak that might seem alien to certain players of this generation. While the rest of the Rangers players was putting an arm around Barisic, the Ibrox gaffer admits that brutal honesty has also triggered a positive reaction. He said:
“Sometimes I’ve got to provoke players. I’ve got to tell them something they’ve not heard before or aren’t comfortable hearing.
“That’s my job. It doesn’t make me think any less of them because I love all the players the same.
“But I know from being a player myself that sometimes it takes a coach to say something you really don’t want to hear.
“That helps get you on the path back to where you should be.
“I’ve got loads of examples from my own career – from Rafa Benitez, Roy Evans, Ronnie Moran, Sammy Lee, Phil Thompson at Liverpool, the list goes on!
“Sometimes you just need to be told the truth. I’ve had really honest conversations with Borna and he knew it himself.
“I’m sure he’ll be the first to admit that his form was now where it should be.
“He’ll look back at those chats now and know why we had to have them.
“Certain players are mollycoddled now but I don’t do that with any player here. The key is communication.
“And Borna’s a fighter. Every Croatian player I’ve ever played with or managed, is a fighter.
“Look at Niko Katic, he’s up for the fight. But these boys are away from home for the first time, that’s the reality of it.
“And where they’ve come from, the demand and expectation that’s here at Rangers, wasn’t there.”
Barisic has played his part in making Gerrard’s side more defensively solid this season. In fact, he now holds the record for the lowest average of goals conceded per game at 0.68. That’s better than the likes of Graeme Souness, Walter Smith, Dick Advocaat and Alex McLeish before him. Gerrard says they had to tighten up from a year ago and believes they’ve achieved that.
He said:“We looked at the defensive record last year because we conceded too many goals.
“It was an area we wanted to improve and that’s the reason we decided to go with four quality centre-backs.
“They’re all slugging out for those positions now in defence.
“That’s the base that we need to build success on. Allan McGregor has also in great form.
“From a defensive organisation point of view, we are where we want to be.
“We’ve had some individual errors that have been costly but, in the main, we are defending well.”
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