Rangers manager Philippe Clement has confirmed John Souttar becomes the latest injury blow at Ibrox, the defender suffering a muscle problem in training and will be out for an unspecified time. This comes on top of midfielder Nico Raskin being confirmed similarly that the Belgian is out for the trip to Dundee meaning Rangers are two further alpha key players down at a very tricky time with a heavy schedule.
As Ibrox Noise discussed, Ben Davies is pretty much reinstalled as number one beside Connor Goldson anyway, but we also touched on the diabolical injury crisis around the club, and that has a plus one now as Souttar now joins the list.
It means that unless Leon Balogun is fit to return to the bench, Rangers will have just two centre-backs v Dundee, two in total, that is, and one more injury and it’s ‘drafting in the kids’ time.
Furthermore, we still don’t know Nico Raskin’s prognosis – Clement still doesn’t know how bad this situation is, he hopes to know better inside the next few days, and can only express a wish that it is short term.
But suddenly the squad is pretty threadbare, as if it wasn’t before.
We have just Tavernier, Goldson, Davies and Ridvan actually fit at the back, with zero senior players available to replace any of them. Devine, Yfeko et al are unknown quantities at this point.
In midfield just Jack and Lundstram, and no one else. It’s hardly ideal.
Rangers really lack depth, and Clement once again referred to the appalling injury situation as a ‘puzzle’.
But for now, we go forward with what we have, and hopefully pick up the three points at Dens.