Giovanni van Bronckhorst spoke about the “winner taking it all” as part of his pre-match press conference, we aren’t quite at that stage yet, however, a positive result tonight would certainly put us in a better position.
In our two Champions League qualifiers so far, I don’t think there would be many in the Rangers support that would have predicted the line-ups and how we set up and I’d be surprised if it is any different an hour before kick-off when the starting XI is revealed – Gio, after all, loves to throw in a surprise or two.
Most of the discussion in the build up has been about the first-leg being at Ibrox and what approach to take against a team that has been scoring goals for fun and whether or not we should set up to play to our strengths rather than pay too much attention to what PSV Eindhoven have been doing.
It’s not an easy one to call but this is who I think we will go with to get the first part of the job done at Ibrox:
There are certain players that have to start and then there are a few positions that could go either way, one of those being at left centre-half. James Sands missed out at the weekend through illness and it may be that Ben Davies keeps his place. The American had an eventful night against Union Saint-Gilloise but there wouldn’t be any complaints if he started either – we do need to find a level of consistency in the middle of defence moving forwards though.
John Lundstram is the only nailed on starter in midfield and who partners him will dictate our tactics. Steven Davis is good in and out of possession and remains one of our best passers of the ball, there is also likely to be more space for him to find his targets. Davis, more so than Glen Kamara or Ryan Jack also allows for Lundstram to drop into the middle of defence should the game state dictate that it is required.
In attack, Ryan Kent and Malik Tillman have to play and Tom Lawrence has equally as strong an argument given his impact since arriving in the summer, playing the Welshman ahead of Scott Wright or Rabbi Matondo gives James Tavernier more space to operate in too given that he is more likely to cut inside and link play centrally.
There will be cries for Alfredo Morelos to come back in which is only natural but he still doesn’t look sharp enough, the flip side of this is that Antonio Colak is flying both in terms of goals and confidence. He has seen space restricted in his first five games and still managed to get three goals, he will be looking for more room in the penalty box tonight to cause the Dutch side problems.
As I touched on before, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Scott Arfield, Wright and Kamara starting either but the line-up will give a huge indication of how we are going to play, as it did against USG. I don’t think we will be quite as attacking but the intent will still be there.
A positive result to take to the Netherlands and we will be more than in with a shout.