Prior to their match against Benfica, Philippe Clement acknowledges that Rangers must find a way out of their current “bad situation.”
The Light Blues have taken off for Portugal in preparation for their match against the Portuguese powerhouses on the opening night of their Europa League campaign. This is their first meeting; the winner advances to the quarterfinals based on the outcome of the return leg, which is played at Ibrox next week. Benfica enters this match in disarray following their crushing 5-0 loss to Porto over the weekend, while Rangers also lost shockingly at home to Motherwell. However, they lead the league by two points after Celtic’s defeat at Hearts the next day.
The Belgian manager, Clement, is adamant that his team arrived in Lisbon intending to win. He will always try to attack and does not think that the bus should be parked. The manager at Ibrox acknowledges that he will be without FOUR wingers tomorrow and that Ross McCausland may receive a late call-up due to his involvement. Many offensive options will be lost for his team as a result, but he maintains that he must find a solution, whether it involves changing the system or starting players a little out of place.
“We miss four wingers tomorrow, Ross [McCausland] maybe also – he did individual work and we will see tomorrow if he can get any minutes,” Clement told the reporters prior to the last 16 first leg matchup. We need to find a solution since that is a poor circumstance where a lot of attacking quality is absent.
We must decide whether to alter the current system or put players in positions they are unfamiliar with. I never play to achieve a draw; we come to win. I have never parked the bus and just defended, and I don’t think that’s right. I have attacked in Madrid and even against PSG.
“If players are focused on the next game, they won’t develop a winning culture. I want them to be hungry to win on every occasion.” For this game, we’ll sell out, and then we’ll sell out again over the weekend. This is how we’re going to finish the season.
“My team is ready to give everything. We need to over-perform and get a little bit of luck. We have to be very efficient.
“We will always fight to create chances like we did in Spain. We need to also defend really well as they have a lot of quality.
Naturally, we want to win at Ibrox because we are aware that anything can happen with our supporters at home. However, we are completely focused on tomorrow and striving for a certain outcome.
“We are incredibly ambitious and want to prove our worth throughout the two legs in order to win, even though we are playing a side with twice our budget. There’s no mental shift; the only thing that could be different is that we might have less ball in the game.”
