Rangers v Sporting Lisbon: Walter Smith short of options as season of attrition takes its toll
As Rangers attempt an assault on four tournaments their progress resembles the charge of the Light Brigade. Fixtures to right of them, fixtures to left of them and casualties mounting as the campaign takes its toll.
Showing his colours: Rangers forward El Hadji Diouf shows off his new haircut with blue streak Photo: PA
By Roddy Forsyth 11:00PM GMT 16 Feb 2011
Lee McCulloch was carted off to the sawbones on Tuesday and is expected to miss most of the remainder of the season after an operation to remedy a cyst on his knee. Mind you, the Light Brigade started with 600 troopers whereas Walter Smith, as he mused wearily yet again ahead of this evening’s Europa League meeting with Sporting Lisbon, cannot even muster strength equal to half a platoon.
His pre-match briefings have become an exercise in repetition. In three sessions last Friday and two yesterday the same questions were posed. Who is available? Who has dropped by the wayside? Will you prioritise competitions?
Smith’s answers likewise comprise a litany. In this case, Nikica Jelavic is ineligible, Steven Naismith a doubt because of the hamstring strain which caused him to be withdrawn during the 6-0 thrashing of Motherwell last Saturday, but Kyle Lafferty is fit again.
And no, as he said in exactly the same words last week, Smith will not consider a sliding scale of tournaments because he cannot tell players that at Rangers they are expected to win every game and then advise them that some fixtures are more equal than others, even though Sunday’s meeting with
Celtic at Parkhead has the feel of an encounter that will go a long way towards determining the outcome of this season’s title race.
“I almost take a simplistic view of these things. When you are at a big club, and you enter a tournament, you want to try to win it,” said Smith. “When I was asked about the League Cup, and whether I was taking it seriously, my answer was quite simple, ‘Is everyone else taking it seriously? Because we’ve been in a lot of finals.’
“It’s the same thing in Europe. OK, there are certain circumstances you have to deal with – Steven Naismith, for instance, is touch and go in terms of fitness for this match. So we’ve got a decision to make – do we risk him or otherwise?
“It’s not just because we play Celtic on Sunday, but also because it is a hamstring strain and we don’t want to risk losing him for a period of time. There are decisions like that to be made but there is no way we will approach this by fielding a team that we think might not win this game just because we got to Celtic Park on Sunday. What if we ended up losing both games?
“If you set out trying to pick and choose your games, then you are
on very dangerous ground in my eyes. I don’t think you could call a European run a distraction.”
Under the circumstances it would be no surprise if Naismith fails to make it, the more so because he had not trained prior to yesterday. Still, with Lafferty available again and
El Hadji Diouf in his thoughts as a candidate for lone striker, Smith is less troubled at having to cope with the absence of Jelavic than he is about the loss of McCulloch.
McCulloch’s experience and expertise in the holding role has been crucial to Rangers’ ability to withstand pressure such as Manchester United imposed when the pair met at Old Trafford in the first match of this season’s Champions League group stage. McCulloch provided both protection for the 40-year-old David Weir and intelligent prompts for the midfield to take the pressure off the Ibrox defence.
There is no like-for-like replacement available. Kyle Bartley, the 19-year-old defender on loan from Arsenal, was employed there against Motherwell and made an impression with his strength and desire to step forward when the opportunity presented itself, but he also evinced a degree of rawness which the Fir Park side were unable to exploit and which would represent a risk against Sporting Lisbon, as Smith acknowledged.
“I see enough in him to know that we could play him but in an area of the field where Sporting are quite strong, in the middle of the pitch, we have a lack of experience with the boys we have left and it’s a wee bit of a problem for us,” said Smith.
The manager is known for his ability to spring a surprise on these occasions and he could, at a pinch, field Bartley as a defender and use the battle-hardened Steven Whittaker in the holding role, although the older man can sometimes be cavalier with his distribution.
Sporting, meanwhile, have fallen on lean times and although they are third in the Portuguese league they are 23 points behind the leaders, Porto, and have played before some alarmingly meagre attendances. There is, inevitably, the feeling that they are ripe for plucking.
However, given that Rangers have won only one of their last 17 European fixtures in open play, Sporting Lisbon may be excused for feeling the same about the Scottish champions.
Rangers (probable, 4-1-4-1): McGregor; Whittaker, Bougherra, Weir, Papac; Bartley; Davis, Diouf, Edu, Weiss; Lafferty.
Sporting Lisbon (probable, 4-5-1): Rui Patricio; Pereira, Grimi, Torsiglieri, Carrico; Santos, Maniche, Mendes, Vukcevic, Valdes; Postiga.
Referee: M Grafe (Germany).
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