With a great start to life at Rangers for manager Philippe Clement as he replaced former gaffer Michael Beale in mid October, the 49 year old former Belgian international defender has guided the Gers to an impressive 22 wins from his opening 26 games, and in that time we have only suffered one defeat.
We have also very quickly closed the points gap that he inherited to the top of the table, and as I type we now hold a two point advantage on the expected nearest challengers. Our Europa League involvement also continues and two odd months on from our very impressive victory over Spanish La Liga side Real Betis, we will now soon find out who we will face in the last 16 stage of the tournament and it could be a good time to take full advantage of a William Hill welcome offer if you like a small flutter.
As fans will know, in securing our 3-2 win over the side, we finished top of the group and we now have the small advantage of avoiding our fellow seeded sides for this round – namely, Atalanta, Bayer Leverkusen, Brighton and Hove Albion, Liverpool, Slavia Prague, Villarreal and Europa Conference League winners last season, West Ham United.
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The draw takes place at GMT 11am on Friday, and we could be looking at some very tasty encounters, even though we will avoid the seeded and supposedly more favoured sides in this year’s competition.
It could mean we are reacquainted with both AC Milan, a side who we have met previously and then, Sporting Lisbon – a side we have knocked out twice in European competitions previously (between 2008 and 2011) – if you add in AS Roma, they are the three big names in the unseeded side of the draw that would probably hold the most interest for fans.
Should we draw Sporting, they will want their own revenge, but revenge is also there for us as there is history with Milan as back in 1957, we were on the wrong end of a 6-1 aggregate defeat in the European Cup, but we have only faced them since then in friendly arrangements.
On the other side of the unseeded draw, we also get the like of sides like Benfica, Freiburg, Marseille, Qarabag and Sparta Prague, who are largely big and storied names in themselves, and would naturally pose challenges of their own.
But this would not surprise anyone really, when you get to the last 16 stage of this tournament and enter the knockout phase you are always going to meet tough teams, with different styles and being out of the group format where a bad day can be better caught up on and rectified.
A two legged affair always requires far more focus, planning and preparation to ensure that a side ultimately come out as victors, as you might get away with a mistake once but that needs immediate countering and beating at the next time of asking.
We also have history with a few of the sides listed above as well, but we have never met Qarabag, Freiburg or Roma in a competitive game previously.
There are pro’s and con’s to drawing each side, but whoever we end up with, our future fate in the competition will be decided on March 7 and 14.
In Clement we trust.
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