Steven Gerrard has delivered a piece of mixed news for Rangers fans, depending on how they look at it.

As Ibrox Noise brought you last year, Filip Helander was originally claimed by other outlets as being back in barely a month following his foot injury last year, but we confirmed it would be March at the absolute earliest, and Stevie today verified the Swede will indeed be AWOL for at least another four or five weeks.

This means Croat Niko Katic is set to retain his place for a good month and a half at least, and may well do enough, if his form improves a touch, to remain permanently in the shirt as first choice.

Which, for fans, is probably the preference.

Gerrard said:

“It’s (Helander) going to be a slow one. Hopefully if everything goes well you’ll be looking at probably four or five weeks but it could be longer than that.”

It’s more likely the ex-Bologna man will not be available till nearly the split at the earliest, meaning his season may well be as good as over as it stands, because depending on where Rangers are by April/May Gerrard might be loathe to alter a long-standing defence.

Either way, sadly for Helander, it’s a bad one.