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Rangers v Union Saint-Gilloise – Matondo starts in new look front four, predicted XI

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Seville seems an awful long time ago.

With a new campaign under way, attentions now turn to succeeding where we failed last year and qualification for the Champions League, however, if you offered fans elimination and the promise of another Europa League final I’d hazard a guess that the vast majority would choose the latter.

As in 2007/08 it would be nice if we could do both though and enjoy a decent run in both competitions starting with victory over Union Saint-Gilloise over the next week.

Giovanni van Bronckhorst has a lot of key players missing, however, summer acquisitions mean that he will be able to call on the likes of Rabbi Matondo, Antonio Colak, Tom Lawrence and Malik Tillman rather than Cedric Itten or Brandon Barker.

With key players of the calibre of Ryan Kent and Alfredo Morelos missing, this is who I think the gaffer will go with to bring a result back to Glasgow:

For Ben Davies and Ridvan Yilmaz, this game has maybe come too quickly to be thrown in, especially when we can trust Borna Barisic and James Sands both to do a job even if they might not be the long term options.

Barisic looked much better in the second half against Livingston when he was tucking inside Kent and Sands locked up the left-hand side of our defence – the 22-year old has begun the season in a very impressive manner and deserves to start.

Gio could go for a more expansive midfield but I don’t think this is the time or the place, especially with so many of the regular attacking players out.

Glen Kamara grew into the modified number ten role when Joe Aribo was playing as a makeshift striker and, despite having other options available now, I don’t think they will be risked just yet, certainly not from the first whistle.

Scott Wright didn’t do himself any favours on Saturday and Lawrence looked good linking with James Tavernier on the right so – with Antonio Colak the obvious central choice – the left wing slot is a straight shoot out between Matondo and Fashion Sakala.

If he’s fit, it has to be Matondo, if not, then Sakala gets the nod. He has always looked more comfortable cutting in from the left but Kent’s consistency means that he has rarely had the chance.

We got the attacking players in earlier enough in this transfer window so that they could settle in, let’s hope they make the impact that they were brought to the club for so that the ones who have served us so well in the past get their chance to shine amongst the continent’s best.

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