RANGERS scraped past Livingston in Wednesday night's Betfred Cup quarter-final thanks to Glen Kamara's early goal, but it was Ricki Lamie's challenge on Joe Aribo that made the headlines afterwards.
The Livi defender contested a ball with Aribo and in the process, elbowed him in the head. The Rangers midfielder was down on the ground for several minutes, had to be stretchered off and had to get 20 stitches - both internal and external - after the match.
Steven Gerrard insisted that there was no malice on Lamie's part in the injury, saying: "I don’t think Lamie has meant to do him. I don't think he's that type. But in my opinion, it was serious foul play.
“There were a few head knocks and couple the last time we played this team as well.
"Now, I have watched Lamie long enough to know he is not that type of player. I’m not accusing him of anything out of order. But that is serious foul play because he has led with the elbow and Joe has been caught."
Despite the Rangers manager's insistence that the challenge was accidental, Gerrard reckons that Livingston provide tough opposition for any side - and says they have been consistently physical when they play his side.
Gerrard said: "We’ve played Livingston twice and there was a yellow card [on Wednesday] night on Connor again for a facial bang.
“There was Joe’s situation and they also got a player sent off for two yellows for the same thing.
“We got the protection at Ibrox because the referee dealt with it in the right way. But I think if the referee sees that again, or if he had the chance to see it again, I think he’d have chosen to make a different decision on that one.”
Livingston are certainly a physical side but going off of the objective stats available to us, they don't appear to be especially dirty. Obviously, there is no data on risky challenges that have went unpenalised but going off of the number of fouls, bookings and sending-offs from this season and the previous one, there is little to suggest that Gary Holt's side are particularly bad-natured.
In Wednesday night's game, for example, Rangers committed 14 fouls compared to Livingston's 11. This doesn't necessarily contradict Gerrard's statement, as we cannot measure how intense a challenge is, but so long as we assume that Livingston are not on the receiving end of favourable refereeing decisions - which is surely the case - then Livingston's tough-tackling approach is within the laws of the game. Incidents like the one involving Aribo are the exception, not the rule.
READ MORE: Glen Kamara satisfied with Cup progress and rare Rangers strike
This season, Livingston have committed 77 fouls in the Premiership - marginally below the league average (77.17), and only three more than the 74 that Rangers have accrued. Kilmarnock have the third-lowest foul count at the league at this early stage of the season with 73 - which isn't far off Livi's total - and the West Lothian side are nowhere near Aberdeen, who have committed the most fouls with 95.
It's a similar story when we look at last season's figures, too: Livingston committed 519 fouls in the league over the course of the season. Well it is true that this is comfortably above the league average of 492, there are no fewer than five teams with greater tallies. Motherwell, Hearts, Hamilton, Aberdeen and Hibernian - who, in particular, have a reputation for open, free-flowing football - were all penalised on more occasions than Holt's side.
When we examine the number of bookings accrued by each Premiership side so far this season Livingston are once again in the middle of the pack. The West Lothian side have collected 10 yellow cards so far this season; Kilmarnock, Hamilton, Hearts and Motherwell all have more.
Last year's figures point to the same conclusion, too. Livingston finished the league season with 58 bookings; only St Johnstone and Celtic picked up fewer yellows. Even Rangers collected more bookings than Livi over the course of the 2018/19 season.
Livi have one red card to their name so far this season that, rather coincidentally, came at Ibrox when Lyndon Dykes was shown a second yellow after a coming-together with Connor Goldson. At this early stage of the season, five clubs have had one dismissal, while Hamilton have already had three players sent off.
Again, a look at last year's figures highlights that, contrary to popular opinion, Livi are not as dirty as they are made out to be. Holt's team picked up three red cards in the league - only St Johnstone accrued fewer - in a season where the league average was 4.5. And in case you'd forgotten, Rangers collected no fewer than nine red cards that Premiership campaign. Even if we take away Alfredo Morelos' four dismissals in the league last season as an anomaly, Gerrard's side still had two more sending-offs than Livingston did. Morelos alone picked up more reds than Livi.
These figures point to one conclusion: Livingston's reputation as a dirty team is [erhaps a little unfair. Yes, they are physical and incidents like the one between Lamie and Aribo are never nice to see, but these are not regular occurences at the Tony Macaroni. Gerrard's assertion that Livingston are afforded an extra degree of physicality could well be true but there is no objective way of measuring this. But in the areas that can be measured and quantified, Livingston are not the dirtiest team. They are slap-bang in the middle of the Premiership in terms of fouls and do not recieve as many cards, yellow or red, as many other top-flight clubs.
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