ROBBIE Crawford is determined to emulate Barrie McKay by taking a circuitous route to becoming a Rangers regular.
Crawford joined Alloa on loan last week and produced a stand-out performance as goals from Graeme Holmes and Eddie Ferns earned the Wasps their first win of the season.
Crawford said: "It was an easy decision to join Alloa as I was not getting involved much at Rangers. I spoke to the manager [Mark Warburton] last week and we agreed that I should go out and get experience.
"I spoke to Alloa and liked what they had to say so I am delighted to be here. It is a good start."
It is Crawford's second stint away from Ibrox after spending four months at Morton last season. "Barrie McKay has done something similar and he has taken his chance to get back into the Rangers team. He is doing really well and I'll be looking to do the same."
After a low-key first half, the visitors took the lead on 59 minutes when on-loan Celtic midfielder Connor McManus took a quick free kick to release Holmes, who slipped the ball beyond Mark Brown.
Crawford almost marked his first start with a goal when he reached a Ferns cutback but his effort was deflected inches over.
Instead it was Ferns who made the points safe with a well-taken late goal. Crawford added: "It was a good team performance where we limited Dumbarton to very few chances. The clean sheet was important and the win meant a lot to the boys."
Manager Danny Lennon said: "The boys worked very hard and I am delighted for them that they got a reward. We worked hard on the shape we wanted the team to play and every player delivered what was asked of them.
"This club have punched above their weight for a few seasons and we can again if we play like that."
Stephen Aitken, the Dumbarton manager, said: "I am bitterly disappointed. We had plenty of possession but lost bad goals. The first goal was poor as the defenders switched off and were more concerned whether it was a free kick or not. They should have been concentrating on the game and not arguing with the referee."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article