Last night I was feeling really good and started well with a couple of good touches.”I have been down in the dumps for a while and it has been hard with the fans. Myself, Andy Watson, and Jan Wouters know the players, we talk about the tactics and we live or die by them.”Adriaanse commented: “Their line-up was strange and I didn’t expect it. I had analysed their last five games but the system had changed and I think Alex took a lot of risk.”Lovenkrands, despite a starring role on Tuesday, still fears McLeish will sell him in January despite helping the team to victory over Porto “It was a magnificent night,” said Lovenkrands “The fans were absolutely outstanding I’ve done all right this season. Peter Lovenkrands was also drafted into the top team, while forgotten man Hamed Namouchi retained his place following his surprise inclusion against Falkirk.Despite the element of risk, McLeish insists the result justifies the changes. He said: “I know my players better than Mr Adriaanse with all due respect. I needed that type of team on the pitch for that game, without a doubt.”The result vindicates the selection but I think I’m more informed than some of the people who would have been surprised by that.

We sat down on Monday and had a chat about what happened and came out ready.”McLeish admits he took a “calculated gamble” by making sweeping changes to his line-up – a move which surprised the Porto coach, Co Adriaanse.Jose-Karl Pierre-Fanfan, Thomas Buffel and Nacho Novo were all put on the bench, while Olivier Bernard was handed his debut at left-back and striker Francis Jeffers earned his first start. We need to go on a sustained run because of the pace Hearts have set.”I’d like to think the players adopt that attitude and tempo in every game because we are an entirely different team when we play like that. We have had a couple of wake-up calls this season and I have had to kick some people up the backside to get them going again We took criticism at the weekend and we deserved it. We take collective responsibility.”Barry Ferguson, the Rangers captain, admits the players had words ahead of Tuesday’s crucial game. “This is the Champions’ League and that is the reason I came back to Rangers. We have been criticised and rightly so in the last two games and we have not produced the goods,” he said.”We were under pressure to give a good performance against Porto and we did that against a decent quality team so I’m delighted for the boys.

The Scottish champions were twice hauled back to level terms by Porto at Ibrox on Tuesday night but were rewarded for a battling display when Sotirios Kyrgiakos scored the winner with five minutes to go.
It was a far cry from the lacklustre display produced by Rangers at the weekend when they were held to a draw in the Bank of Scotland Premier League by newcomers Falkirk.Defeats by Aberdeen and Hibernian had already dented their hopes of retaining the title and the result against Falkirk leaves them fifth in the table and trailing leaders Hearts by eight points.Now McLeish has demanded his players give the rest of the SPL the same treatment they handed out to Porto. He said: “I would like to think that performance could be the catalyst to get us on track at domestic level. Fabian Canobbio’s 77th-minute winner shocking 80,000 Bernabeu fans.TUESDAYLyon 3 Real Madrid 0Real’s galacticos are humbled yet again – this time at the hands of G?rd Houllier’s Lyon in the Champions’ League.. Alex McLeish, the Rangers manager, hopes their dramatic Champions’ League win over Porto will act as a springboard for their domestic campaign. “We want to do better than last season,” said Jean-Michel Aulas, the Lyon president. “The fact that this year’s final will be played at the Stade de France may be a sign.”Beckham’s week to forgetWEDNESDAYN Ireland 1 England 0A Beckham-led England suffer the embarrassment of World Cup defeat in Belfast against the team ranked equal 116th.SATURDAYReal Madrid 2 Celta Vigo 3Beckham is powerless to stop newly promoted Celta Vigo beating Real in La Liga. Yet the French champions also spent £28m on players in the summer and look at least as strong as last year.Carew, Brazilian striker Fred and former Chelsea midfielder Tiago have fitted in quickly and are blending well with the likes of the playmaker Juninho, who was superb against Real.Lyon are likely to get through a group also featuring Olympiakos and Rosenborg but are looking further ahead.

“This is good for our confidence but we must not get carried away,” he added. “We have played just one match.”Some of the Lyon fans feared that their team’s chances this season might have been hampered by the sale of Michael Essien to Chelsea. “We played a really good match against a very good Real team, no matter what the Spanish media say,” he said.While establishing themselves as the team to beat in France, Lyon have never quite made it in Europe, going out at the quarter-final stage of the Champions’ League in the last two seasons.”We can go a long way,” said their captain, the Brazilian defender Claudio Cacapa. Our luck will change though, we just had a tremendous amount of bad luck.”G?rd Houllier, the Lyon coach and former manager of Liverpool, was full of praise for his players. “But no one needs to say anything to us because we are also very upset about it.

“There is still a long way to go and we hope this suffering will be a positive for us later on.”Iker Casillas, who saved Juninho’s penalty, also recognised the need to work on their defence but did not believe the result was a fair reflection of the game. “Anyone who didn’t see the game would think it was a mad result,” said Casillas. We need to work on putting this aspect of our game right,” Raul added. Now we have a few days to study the areas we need to work on.”As in Saturday’s defeat to Celta Vigo at the Bernabeu, it was set-pieces that were Real’s undoing. Carew flicked on a Juninho free-kick for the opening goal after 21 minutes and the Brazilian doubled the advantage with another free-kick from 35 yards, soon after.”In football set-pieces are very important and, as against Celta, we conceded goals from them. Coincidentally, a few days earlier, Madrid had also lost 3-0 in the Champions’ League – that time against Bayer Leverkusen.Raul, the Real captain, said his side have to learn from their mistakes.”We knew that Lyon were a good side,” he admitted, “the difference was they took their chances.