Rangers 0-3 Napoli: Serie A leaders claim victory against 10-man hosts

Rangers fell to their third consecutive heavy defeat without scoring despite a more encouraging performance against Napoli in the playoffs.

The victory was secured by Matteo Politano's penalty and late strikes, but only after Allan McGregor twice denied him from the spot.

James Sands was sent off for giving the first penalty and he did not deny Politano.

The Italian forward put the ball low into the corner past the reach of the Rangers keeper after Borna Barisic was called for a penalty.

After two games, Napoli are top of Group A and Rangers are winless.

• Reaction & as it happened

The upcoming matches will be a stern test for Giovanni van Bronckhorst's side, but this performance will give them more hope than their recent losses to Celtic and Amsterdam.

This was much more like the Rangers of last season's Europa League, as they played with more energy from the start, even though they were down to 10 men.

After just 35 seconds, Morelos headed over to give Rangers a 2-0 lead. Scott Arfield forced a fine save from Alex Meret before the break.

As Napoli continued to threaten, McGregor was set to become the hero again when he denied Zielinski when he was clean through.

Politano swept in the rebound, but was judged to have intruded after a long VAR check. After stepping up again, the Pole found no more joy as he went for the same corner.

Politano got his goal when Barisic's arm blocked a goal-bound shot, which resulted in a second penalty.

Rangers struggled as Napoli's bench was strong enough to kill the match.

After a nice lay off from Anguissa, Ndombele was able to sweep home after a sniff in the box.

It was another brutal lesson for Rangers against a top-quality team, as if they needed it after a difficult opening match in Amsterdam.

Man of the match - Andre-Frank Zambo Anguissa

Napoli punish Rangers' lapses - analysis

Rangers turned in a much better performance after a difficult fortnight, as their manager got the response he wanted from the start.

When the ball wasn't in the box, Morelos allowed Rangers to attack and cause problems, even though he wasn't at his best.

The team was applauded off vociferously at half time, a sign of their improvement.

If you don't switch off for a few seconds, you will be punished. Napoli took advantage of Sands' desperation as he tried to stop Simeone.

It looks like qualification is going to be a challenge with the home and away games coming up. There is at least one thing to build on for Rangers.

What they said

The performance was good, but the result was not good. I don't believe we deserved to lose.

We were in the game from the beginning and had some big chances. We were in the game at 11 v 11 even though we were down by a goal.

Match stats

• This is only the second time Rangers have lost both opening Champions League group games. The same thing happened in 1996-97 under Walter Smith.
• Since 2003-04, Napoli are only the third side to be awarded two or more penalties in back-to-back Champions League (also v Liverpool on MD1).
• Rangers had 10 shots - six more than against Ajax in their opening match. The last time they had that at least many without scoring was against Lyon in December 2007, losing 3-0 (also 10 shots).
• Sands is the third American to be sent off in the Champions League after Sacha Kljestan (2013 for Anderlecht) and John Brooks (2021 for Wolfsburg)
• Napoli have won both their opening group stage matches for only the second time (also in 2016/17). Meanwhile, seven goals is the most they've scored after two matches in a single campaign in the competition.
• Aged 40 years and 226 days, Allan McGregor became the Champions League's fifth oldest player (behind Marco Ballotta 43y 252d, Gianluigi Buffon 42y 315d, Oleksandr Shovkovskiy 41y 255d and Mark Schwarzer 41y 206d.

What's next?

The game between Rangers and Dundee United will take place on Saturday.