Rangers hero Cyriel Dessers makes big admission on Ibrox noise - 'at the start I think it got to me'

The Nigerian, a summer signing from Cremonese, scored the two goals on Sunday afternoon that downed Hearts to book a place in next month’s Scottish Cup final against Celtic. The strikes took his tally to the season for 19 goals. It is not a bad return for a player experiencing his first campaign in Scottish football. Yet the 29-year-old still gets plenty of criticism for chances that he misses and general play. He has finally learned to blank out the backdrop.

“It’s important to close out the noise, even after a few months, or for a few guys a couple of years, we have the experience of that,” said Dessers, who has not been the only player taking criticism after Rangers’ loss at Ross County and draw at Dundee in the Premiership. “You have to stay focused, in these weeks you have to block out the noise. At the start I think it got to me. That’s something I learned from as well. Now I have everything in line, in my head as well. When there’s noise now I can shut it out and I think that’s what we all need to do over the next few weeks.”

Six matches remain for Rangers, five in the league and then the May 25 Scottish Cup showdown with Celtic. There is so much on the line. “It’s not been easy, it’s not the first time this season either,” continued Dessers. “But after a difficult week or result we always bounce back and we did so again against Hearts. Obviously, all eyes in the country were on us and what we were going to do after the last two results. But if you can show this character, at Hampden, in a semi-final, against a good team then I think that says a lot about this team.

“It doesn’t sound very positive if you say every time you win there’s relief. You have to enjoy these moments, not only today but I think about the Benfica game. Okay, we lost and we were devastated we didn’t qualify. But when I came home I said these are the games I want to play in for Rangers. These are moments you want to enjoy. This is why we play football. But we know what we have to do next week [against St Mirren in the league].”

Dessers opened the scoring on four minutes, just moments after missing a good chance. He then put the match out of reach on 77 minutes just as Hearts were threatening a comeback. “For me personally it was an amazing day, to score the goals to take us to a cup final,” Dessers added. “It’s weird. You have to enjoy the afternoon and this feeling. But at the same time you are thinking about the future and what is next. I have to take my time, let this sink in and enjoy it. It’s obviously a very good feeling, I am delighted.

“We can take a lot of pride from this because Hearts are a very good team, they deserve to be third in the league. They gave us some difficulties, but I thought our defence and goalkeeper were amazing today. They kept a clean sheet and afterwards it’s up to us as attackers to score goals and finish this game.”