Dynamo Kyiv vs Rangers Preview: Don't lose please.

2nd competitive fixture of the season for Rangers tonight and it's a tough one, away in Lublin to play Dynamo Kyiv. I can't profess to being an expert on Ukrainian football, but they had a very impressive result in the last round with a 9-2 aggregate win over Partizan Belgrade.

Given how we looked on Saturday, I don't think we can feel particularly confident about playing anyone at the moment, especially not anyone good enough to make it to the latter Champions league qualifying rounds. In our last 2 seasons we've made hard work of this 3rd round qualifier, needing to come back from 2 goals against Union St Gilloise and eventually limping across the line against Servette with a 1-1 draw in the second leg when we could have been home and hosed in the first leg.

What those results show is that both legs are massively important in these ties, so I think given the state of the squad and how we've been playing, I'd be happy with us displaying a bit of caution in our approach. In theory, we shouldn't fear anyone at Ibrox(EDIT: unfortunately, we aren't playing there), so a 0-0 would put us in good stead for the second leg.

Elsewhere, Big Phil spoke to the press ahead of the game. He revealed that Oscar Cortes will be out for around 4-5 weeks following his enforced substitution at Tynecastle, not great news for the Colombian, but given our injury record I know I'm not the only one that's relieved it's only 5 weeks.

On new signing Robin Propper, he said that although he is fit to play, he's had a busy couple days settling in Scotland. I find these comments quite concerning, especially given the state of affairs at the back, I'd much rather not have to see anymore of Ben Davies in a Rangers shirt if I can avoid it. It was Balogun in the conference with Phil so hopefully he is starting tonight if Propper isn't, silver linings and all that.

In all seriousness, we are trying to be a professional outfit, a lot has been made of Malachi Boateng playing for Hearts despite being announced 8 minutes before kick off. I can remember watching the Amazon All or Nothing documentary on Tottenham Hotspur, and they covered the signing of Steven Bergwijn and how quickly he came to London, was settled by the club, told his family would be looked after, then came off the bench a few days later against Manchester City and scored. I'm no big admirer of Spurs, but that's how a top club handles a late signing in the window, sadly that doesn't seem to be our approach.

Aside from that there was nothing of note in the press conference, both Clement and Balogun reinforced how important it is for us to qualify for the Champions League. Good to see we are all agreed on something. We did continue to show off our impressive Wheeler Dealers style negotiation techniques by revealing that Hagi will definitely be leaving the club, which is good because I was under the impression he was playing for the B team for a laugh while we are forced to watch Tom Lawrence towing a caravan every week.

Cortes' injury does raise the question of who replaces him in the starting line-up tonight. We are hardly blessed with options, the hope is that Cerny will start on the right, unless we go for a system change (which I would be for) which means it will be one of Matondo or Wright on the left.

I was told by a friend of a friend that I didn't criticise Scott Wright enough in my first match review, allow me to amend that now. Scott Wright playing for Rangers depresses me, seeing him playing the exact same way every single minute of his career with seemingly no improvement makes me want to simply turn off the TV whenever he is on the pitch for us. He would be very low down on any list I made of potential wide options for Rangers, behind Broxi bear.

When Matondo appeared off the bench against Hearts at halftime, I said to my friend that he will do what he always does, some good things and some bad things. He did score in the playoff round against PSV last season, so on pure historical basis he gets in over Scott Wright for me.

I think our best option, especially for this kind of cautious away game, would be to give Jefte a start on the left wing. Now he's not a winger by trade, but he showed in pre season that he's very handy when getting forward and has a fantastic engine. I think starting him ahead of Yilmaz would allow us to let Cerny and Tavernier get higher on the other side of the pitch. At the very least, it's an option we haven't seen before, and I like to see big risks being taken.

Aside from that I'd like to see Propper coming in at the back and maybe a start for Danilo to give us some running upfront. While I'd like to see changes in the rest of the team, I think it's unlikely, although the changes I've suggested are also unlikely, so who knows.

The Albion Rrahmani rumours have appeared again, not sure how reliable that source is, but clearly it's easy engagement to write about Rangers needing a striker whenever we have looked terrible. He has been linked for a long time, so if we hear anything more solid I'll look at writing up some analysis on him.

That's all for today, the game is on Premier Sports tonight. Let's do our best to watch it without covering our eyes in horror.