Rangers welcome Dundee United to Ibrox tonight to get basck on track with the rest of the SPL in terms of games played.
| Rangers will go into tonight's rearranged SPL game against Dundee United without Jean-Claude Darcheville due to a calf strain but he should be okay to return to action at the weekend. Manager Walter Smith will be able to welcome back Kevin Thomson and Kenny Miller who are both fit after suffering knocks against Inverness, while Barry Ferguson could be in line to start after returning from a lengthy spell on the sidelines on Saturday. Meanwhile, DaMarcus Beasley is more interested in getting points to add to the tally rather than looking at the quality of performances as Rangers attempt to move level with Celtic at the top of the league. Beasley is well aware expectations will be high following Saturday's 5-0 thrashing of Inverness. However, these games do not come along that often and Beasley is realistic enough to be willing to settle for the narrowest of victories as long as Rangers put the necessary points on the board. Beasley said: "For me, personally, it doesn't matter if we win by one, two or three goals - as long as we win the game and get the three points. The fans want to see good football and good goals. I heard fans shouting for six at the weekend. But we won the game and that's the main thing. Sometimes you play good football and lose the match and that doesn't help. Other times you play badly, get the win, and then move on to the next game. Sometimes it doesn't matter how many goals you score or how good the football is - sometimes you just have to grind out the win." Rangers will be under pressure to take full advantage of the game in hand - which was initially postponed following the death of United chairman Eddie Thompson - but Beasley is unfazed by the challenge. He went on : "The pressure is always on when you play for Rangers or Celtic so we have pressure on us to win every game domestically and even in Europe. I'm sure a lot of the fans were disappointed when we didn't win the UEFA Cup final (against Zenit St Petersburg in May). At a club like this, you have to win every game whether it's home or away and no matter who you are playing. Even if it's Barcelona it doesn't matter - we need to win. The players here know that and we will go out there and try to get the job done. We know we have a game in hand and, if we win, we will be on the same points as Celtic. It's not really about playing catch-up, we just have to concentrate on the games where we aren't playing Celtic, like tomorrow. We need to get points against the teams like Inverness and Aberdeen as the games against Celtic will take care of themselves." United manager Craig Levein cannot call upon striker Roy O'Donovan after he was sent off against Falkirk at the weekend and picked up a suspension. The Irishman was issued with a straight red card for violent conduct and Spaniard Francisco Sandaza is likely to return in his place alongside Warren Feeney. Striker Jon Daly is also ruled out with a groin strain, while defender Mihael Kovacevic is pushing for a place in tonight's team. Levein admits he was disappointed with O'Donovan's dismissal and has claimed world governing body FIFA are turning the game soft. The United boss had been praising O'Donovan for his efforts and believed he was going to be a significant player for the team in the weeks ahead. Levein, a rugged centre-half during his own playing days with Hearts, has been a critic of referees this season but voiced his sympathy for official Iain Brines on this occasion. When on commentary duty on Sunday, Levein was vehement in his criticism of the game moving to a non-contact sport. He said: "When you bring new players here there are certain things you can't tell them and they need to experience for themselves. In this country there are a lot of things such as tackling and aggression which are being taken out of the game. There are a new breed of referees who are being told `we can't have this' or `we can't have that'. But when I was brought up as long as you went for the ball fairly and didn't hurt anyone it was fine. It's not the referee's fault and I'm not blaming Iain Brines one bit, what I've got an issue with is the rules which are coming from FIFA these days. Tackling is an art as much as shooting or taking free-kicks are but it's being slowly phased out. As a result the job is getting harder and harder for refs." | |
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