I have to say that, in a complete reverse of my opinion expressed at the start of this thread, I now agree with CollegeRosco that Boyd must start every game for Rangers. Having said that I have one big proviso, it must be as part of a front two with an energetic skillful partner, be it Miller, Novo or even Lafferty. He cannot play in the formation Rangers played for most of last season and in several games at the start of this season. If Ferguson, Mendes and Davis can be relied on to give Rangers sufficient midfield dominance then the luxury of Boyd can be accomodated in the team. What a luxury though eh? It's almost a gauranteed goal a game.

It must be said though, his goal apart, he was characteristically rotten today, as he also was whilst scoring last week

I've said it before, but it's worth saying again. All we wanted Boyd to do was up his workrate and be more of a team player. We never had any doubts about his goalscoring ability. We all know he has huge limitations in his natural ability, but he is a lethal finisher, and you just can't question his goalscoring record in the three years he's been a Rangers player.

 

He has improved his fitness and his workrate quite considerably this season. I listened with interest yesterday as the Radio Scotland commentators commented on Boyd chasing back a full 50 yards to retrieve a slack pass of his own, and winning the ball back for the team. He simply wasn't doing that sort of thing last season.

 

His attitude is good at the moment, and his goalscoring is outweighing his lack of natural ability. Long may that continue, and he appears to have finally got the message from Walter Smith after being left out of every single significant match last season.

 

I'll be astonished if he doesn't start against Celtic on Saturday.

One chance for Boyd in the big game, and he filled his shorts. Contrast that with the one chance McDonald got.

Boyd was a big disappointment on Saturday. The one chance he got he should have done better with. I thought he should have hit it much sooner but the delay helped Boruc who did well to save.

 

Boyd's general play was nowhere near the standard he had shown in recent months and I felt he spent too much time time complaining to the referee which ,as often happens when you do that in games, the referee gets fed up with the constant complaining and starts giving decisions against you when otherwise the player may have got the decision.

 

 

So it's 20 goals in 20 starts for Boyd.

 

Today was typical Boyd, absolutely hopeless for 80 minutes, then he pops up with two deadly finishes in the final 10 minutes to kill the game off for us. He had three attempts on goal today, two went in and the other was a clever snapshot that nearly caught the goalkeeper out. But his general play was simply awful.

 

Again, the goals have come against one of the lesser teams, and until such times as he starts scoring in the Old Firm games or in Europe then the doubts will remain. But you just can't leave him out of the team, because if Boyd wasn't scoring for us at the moment, who would be ? His nearest challenger in the goalscoring stakes at Ibrox is Kenny Miller with 7.

Kris Boyd is currently 7th in the running for The Golden Boot :-

 

1.	Marc Janko	Red Bull Salzburg	30	1.5	45
2.	Vedat Ibisevic	1899 Hoffenheim	18	2	36
3.	Vagner Love	ZSKA Moskou	20	1.5	30
	Samuel Eto'o	FC Barcelona	15	2	30
5.	Stefan Maierhofer	Rapid Wien	19	1.5	28,5
6.	Nicolas Anelka	FC Chelsea	14	2	28
7.	Kris Boyd	Glasgow Rangers	18	1.5	27
8.	David Villa	FC Valencia	13	2	26
9.	Diego Milito	CFC Genua	12	2	24
	Patrick Helmes	Bayer Leverkusen	12	2	24
	Daniel Nannskog	Stabaek IF	16	1.5	24
	André-Pierre Gignac	FC Toulouse	12	2	24
	Alberto Gilardino	AC Florenz	12	2	24
	Marco Di Vaio	AC Florenz	12	2	24
15.	Ingemar Teever	JK Nömme Kalju	23	1	23
16.	Mounir El Hamdaoui	AZ Alkmaar	15	1.5	22,5
17.	Grafite	VfL Wolfsburg	11	2	22
	Diego Forlan	FC Villarreal	11	2	22
	Robinho	Manchester City	11	2	22
	Fernando Cavenaghi	Girondins Bordeaux	11	2	22
	Guillaume Hoarau	Paris Saint-Germain	11	2	22
	Gonzalo Higuain	Real Madrid	11	2	22
	Amauri	Juventus	11	2	22
	Nikita Andreev	Levadia Tallinn	22	1	22
25.	Erwin Hoffer	Rapid Wien	14	1.5	21
	Milan Baros	Galatasaray	14	1.5	21
27.	Claudio Pizarro	Werder Bremen	10	2	20
	Milivoje Novakovic	1. FC Köln	10	2	20
	Amr Zaki	Wigan Athletic	10	2	20
	Lionel Messi	FC Barcelona	10	2	20
	Zlatan Ibrahimovic	Inter Mailand	10	2	20
	Karim Benzema	Olympique Lyon	10	2	20
	Rhys Griffiths	FC Llanelli	20	1	20

says on the bbc that birmingham claim he will be thier player by the end of the week, if rangers sell boyd kiss the league good bye

you'll sell him on 2nd feb

I would say three of the six above Boyd.

22 starts, 22 goals. Can he keep this up for the full season ?

 

Next week is another big test for Boyd. Away to Aberdeen is one of those "big games" for Rangers that we say he doesn't score in. He's scored plenty against Aberdeen at Ibrox, but I don't recall him scoring many (if any) at Pittodrie.

Here's some more interesting stats taken from FF. I haven't had a chance to verify their accuracy, but I have no reason to doubt them.

 

 

Aberdeen......played 11...won 5...draws 3...lost 3...scored 7
Celtic...........played 5....won 1....draws 1...lost 3...scored 1
Dundee Utd...played 9....won 3....draws 4...lost 2...scored 7
Falkirk..........played 9....won 8....draws 0...lost 1...scored 8
Hamilton.......played 2....won 2....draws 0...lost 0...scored 5
Hearts..........played 10...won 6....draws 2...lost 2...scored 5
Hibs.............played 8.....won 4....draws 2...lost 2...scored 4
Inverness.....played 7.....won 5....draws 1...lost 1...scored 8
Kilmarnock....played 11...won 9....draws 1...lost 1...scored 12
Motherwell....played 10...won 6....draws 4...lost 0...scored 5
St Mirren......played 9.....won 7....draws 1...lost 1...scored 4
Dunfermline...played 4.....won 3....draws 1...lost 0...scored 1
Gretna.........played 2.....won 2....draws 0...lost 0....scored 2
Livingstone...played 1.....won 1....draws 0...lost 0....scored 2

Rangers' points ratio in SPL games in which Boyd has featured :-

Aberdeen 18 from 33 points
Celtic 4 out of 15 points
Dundee Utd 13 out of 27 points
Falkirk 24 out of 27
Hamilton 6 out of 6
Hearts 20 out of 30
Hibs 14 out of 24
Inverness 16 out of 21
Kilmarnock 28 out of 33
Motherwell 22 out of 30
St Mirren 22 out of 27
Dunfermline 10 out of 12
Gretna 6 out of 6
Livingston 3 out of 3

Interesting statistics but you can show them in different ways. What about the following for instance:-

 

Played 98 games  Scored 71 goals looks a bit better, doesn't it?

 

The main problem that Boyd has is that he is not scoring enough in away games against the likes of Hearts, Hibs and of course Celtic. From memory I don't think he has played many away games against Celtic and anyway too much is made about him only scoring one goal against them. If we had won the games in which he played against them his goal record would not be an issue. How many games did the likes of Gordon Durie and others play against Celtic and never managed to find the net against them?

 

In fact how many games has Kenny Miller played against them in total in his two spells and what is his goal ratio against them?

 

 

Don't get me wrong, Rosco. I didn't put those stats up as a criticism of Boyd, it was purely out of interest.

 

I am of the opinion at the moment that we simply can't afford to leave Boyd out of the team. While he is scoring the number of goals he is at the moment he is invaluable to the side.

 

It's when he's not scoring that he contributes nothing else.