Sturm Graz vs Rangers – Preview, Lineups, Score Prediction
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Fixture: Sturm Graz vs Rangers
Competition: Europa League
Kick-off: 2nd October, 20:00 UK time
Sturm Graz and Rangers meet in a matchday two Europa League clash after suffering defeats against Midtjylland and Genk, respectively, in their opening fixtures.
The two teams are meeting 24 years after they met in the 2000/01 Champions League first group stage, with memories harking back to seemingly times where there was more room for romanticism when the possibility of a team being unknown entities remained, not just for fans but for the opponents too, and the disparities between the different leagues was smaller.
This time around, the sides will be meeting in a Europa League clash after enduring heavy defeats in the Champions League playoff round, Sturm Graz to Bodo/Glimt and Rangers to Club Brugge, with both teams seeking varying degrees of pragmatism to eke out results.
Rangers have started their season so badly that Russell Martin has earned comparisons to Paul Le Guen and Pedro Caixinha, the latter being the manager with the shortest tenure in the Gers’ history at 229 days.
Encouragingly for Rangers though, they have managed two wins in their last three games in all competitions, over the past week.
They first progressed in the Scottish League Cup by beating Hibernian 2-0, a win which Martin claimed came under difficult circumstances, and earned their first Scottish Premiership win through a Max Aarons winner in injury time against Livingston, and the boss shrugging off talk it kept him in a job.
Martin will not be worried about the performances as long as Rangers can keep grinding out results and an away trip to Sturm Graz will present an opportunity to put in a solid performance with perhaps less pressure from the fans.
Sturm Graz are second in the Austrian Bundesliga to Rapid Vienna, albeit with a game in hand, in a season they began as defending champions.
They too left it late in their weekend clash against Hartberg, needing an injury time own-goal from Dominic Vincze to secure all three points.
The Austrian club certainly have fewer problems than Rangers and do not have to worry about their domestic form after a successful start to the campaign.
Sturm Graz’s only league defeats of the campaign have come by single goal margins, to Rapid Vienna and Austria Vienna, and they find themselves being a balanced side.
Their defeat to Midtjylland came from two goals which goalkeeper Oliver Christensen will have felt he could have better dealt with, despite making a string of impressive saves in-between the sticks.
Both teams will want to get their Europa League campaign off and running, with Sturm Graz facing a tricky away trip to Rangers’ rivals Celtic next in the Europa League.
In a bit of trivia, Max Johnston, who transferred to Derby County in the summer after winning back-to-back Austrian Bundesliga titles with Sturm Graz, is the son of Allan Johnston, who featured for Rangers in their home fixture against the Austrian side in 2000.
Predicted Lineups
Recent Form (league)
Sturm Graz: WLWWL
Rangers: WLDDD
Key Men
Sturm Graz
Oliver Christensen will be aware that despite the keys saves he made against Midtjylland, the highlights package will feature prominently the goals he conceded, with one attributed as an own goal and the other as an error, and will want to set things right by keeping a clean sheet.
Seedy Jatta has five goals for his team this season and will want to continue his goalscoring form against a Rangers side that have shown that they are prone to defensive errors.
Otar Kiteishvili has been the heart of the Austrian side, with play passing through him, and the Georgian midfielder finds himself as joint top-scorer with Jatta. He missed the weekend game with a family issue, but is now back.
Rangers
James Tavernier is now amongst the top ten appearance makers for the club and has four goals and an assist this season despite missing a penalty against Livingston. Rangers will need all his experience at Sturm Graz.
Djeidi Gassama is the joint top-scorer for the Gers along with Tavernier and is one summer signing fans can agree has been a good bit of business. Martin needs him to stand up in Austria.
Martin remains under pressure and knows that the only thing a single game can achieve now is getting him sacked from his job and will want to focus on the basics and look to steadily build-up a run of results.
Match Prediction
Rangers’ form has been so poor that one former Gers star has claimed that the players at a loss for what to do on the pitch.
Another ex-Rangers star claimed that the win against Livingston changes nothing in the fans minds regarding how they view Martin.
Martin claimed that the result showed that the players are fighting for him and the coaching staff, but he will know all too well, they have let him and themselves down with multiple individual errors leading to goals and having already accumulated three red cards for the season.
The difficulty in such a situation lies in trying to prove the naysayers wrong week-in, week-out and Martin and his side will be well served to tune out the noise and let the results on the pitch do the talking.
The talismanic Tavernier has brought such gravity to his role, that it was fellow right-back Max Aarons who popped up for the winner against Livingston after Tavernier’s early goal and missed penalty, and expect more of the same with Sturm Graz’s left flank coming under pressure.
Sturm Graz will know that this is a Rangers side ripe for the taking and any sustained period of pressure from them will be panic stations for Rangers. They will want to set the cat amongst the pigeons with an early goal.
Inside Futbol Score Prediction
Sturm Graz 3-1 Rangers
Where To Watch?
The match will be shown live across the UK on the TNT Sports channel from 20:00 on Thursday.
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