Rangers v St Johnstone – shock return to midfield as Gerrard makes four changes, predicted XI

Rangers take on St Johnstone tonight in the first match of a double header with an unbeaten league campaign and place in the Scottish Cup semi-finals at place.

League duty up first and after the Old Firm clash at the weekend, Steven Gerrard may be tempted to give a few players the night off, however, as we have seen before, this squad thrives when playing twice a week and I don’t think there will be the wholesale changes that many in the support would predict.

The “Covid-5” hearing with the SFA isn’t until tomorrow so there remains no reason to rush James Tavernier back into action, however, with him likely to be needed from the start on Sunday, it would be good to see him get at least half an hour tonight.

Leon Balogun remains injured so the defence should stay the same, I’m a great believer in consistency in a back four and the only change should be Jon McLaughin coming in for Allan McGregor, yes, there is no room for sentiment but it will do his chances of selection for the European Championships no harm if he has at least a few games under his belt between now and the end of the season.

With this in mind, this is the team I think we should go with to take on the Saints and continue our incredible league form:

Bongani Zungu would have started against Cove Rangers but for injury and with his return to fitness I’d expect him to start tonight to give Steven Davis a rest, with Ryan Jack out for the season we need to make sure we don’t lose another key player in the engine room.

Kemar Roofe came off the bench on Sunday but should continue his return to full fitness with a start tonight, that we can take Alfredo Morelos out of the team without really weakening it remains one of the main reasons we won the league so early – he’s also got previous form against the Saints.

The other change I’d make is to bring Ianis Hagi in for Scott Arfield, different players but we don’t lose any creativity or goal threat plus the Romanian international hasn’t featured as often recently and will be a fresh pair of legs, like Roofe, he enjoys playing against the men from Perth.

This season has very much been about picking the right players for certain games and although the talk is about the Scottish Cup being the priority, don’t be surprised to see us go with a strong line-up tonight, the last thing we would want to do is give Callum Davidson’s side any hope ahead of such a big game at the weekend.