Rangers ready to repeat Europa League successes and to play in front of fans again, Steven Gerrard says
Such has been the euphoria amongst Rangers supporters after last weekend’s Old Firm derby victory that it is easy to overlook the magnitude of the task facing Steven Gerrard and his players as they prepare to embark upon their Europa League group campaign away to Standard Liege. The Ibrox side reached the last 16 of the tournament and were ejected by Bayer Leverkusen only when the second leg was played in August, five months after the first instalment in Glasgow in March, in the last game played in Scotland before the Covid-19 shutdown.
The August match took Rangers’ total of Europa League fixtures to 18 for 2019-20, one short of the equivalent of half a domestic season, but they have at least as formidable a task to make a similar impact this time, given that they are third seeds in Group D, behind Benfica and Standard. Europe, though, has been the arena in which Gerrard has achieved the most notable progress of his three years in charge and he believes that it has been a self-sustaining process.
“Winning and winning against good teams and players breeds confidence and belief. You can show the players the evidence when we debrief games,” he said. “We can watch them back and find the reasons why we have had success, even when no-one has really given us a chance.
“I think coming on these Europa League challenges and managing to get positive results has been a major part of us growing and evolving as a group.”
Rangers’ tactical performance against Celtic has been a lively topic of conversation on both sides of Glasgow’s football schism and suggests that their capacity to make an impact at this level might have increased, providing they can also cope with the demands of realignment between European midweeks and domestic weekends. “It’s certainly a target for us,” Gerrard said.
“It was very different in qualifying this year with one leg ties and there was no margin for error. To face teams like Willem II and Galatasaray, the players did fantastically well to reach this stage. Now the challenge is to take each game as it comes again. We have to be looking to get out of the group.”
Standard have lost three players to the coronavirus — Nicolas Raskin, Moussa Sissako, and Michael-Ange Balikwisha — all of whom tested positive on Tuesday, as did Jan van Steenberghe, the goalkeeping coach.
All four are in quarantine, as are Damjan Pavlovic and Abdoul Fessal Tapsoba, Sissako’s flatmates, although the Belgian club hope for a dispensation to field the latter two, further tests permitting. “We’re coming up against a very good team with a big squad full of talented players. I’m sure they’ll cope,” Gerrard said.
“It’s not ideal from their point of view but we’re here to do a job and take maximum points. The Standard team that we thought might have started might change in a couple of areas, so we have to be ready to adapt in certain situations. We’re focused on what we have to do.
“We have our own game plan and will try to focus on what we have to do and hit a level close to our best because that’s how we’re going to have to go about it.”
On the plus side for Standard will be the presence of 3750 of their supporters — all of whom must wear face masks — in the Stade Maurice Dufrasne. Uefa have sanctioned clubs to admit spectators to their competitions if local authorities permit the gathering.
Gerrard, whose memories of the stadium extend to a substitute appearance in place of Robbie Keane in a Champions League third round qualifier in August, 2008, declared himself content to see the fans, even if they constitute an advantage to the home team.
“We have no issue at all. Anything that’s within the rules is fine,” he said. “I’ve played in this stadium when it’s full and it’s a fantastic place to play football.
“We’re a little closer to where we want to be and that’s to have the fans in at full capacities and really exciting atmospheres to test ourselves. Obviously, it’s only a certain percentage.
“Hopefully, domestically, we can try to make moves to get the ball rolling and have fans back in the stadiums when it’s safe to do so, so it’s very welcome. We’re really looking forward to a different atmosphere tomorrow.”
