The bi-polar Rangers season continues with the draw at Easter Road confirming something that many predicted might happen in the summer.
Philippe Clement continues to live dangerously as manager and will point to individual mistakes and officiating as a deflection for what really happened against Hibernian.
With Dujon Sterling limping off, Rangers are now down to just Robin Propper and Leon King as the senior squad centre-halves that are available for selection in the squad – a situation that was easily avoidable.
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How Philippe Clement could have prevented Rangers injury crisis
John Souttar is out for several weeks, Neraysho Kasanwirjo out, probably, for the season and both Leon Balogun and Sterling are far from reliable in terms of availability.
Kasanwirjo, when he was signed, had a solid profile other than having a history of knee problems – he is now unavailable because of another knee injury.
Everyone knows what Balogun is capable of, however, Father Time waits for no man and, alongside Souttar, was a huge risk in terms of expecting him to be fit for 50-60 games.
Balogun should have been supernumerary, an extra body, a ‘break glass in case of emergency’ type of contract extension.
For both Clement and Nils Koppen not to identify that this situation was a possibility isn’t good enough.
The manager can talk about bad luck and other factors being an influence, but he is more to blame than anyone for the current injury crisis.
When will Rangers get reinforcements back?
When asked when Rangers might get Sterling and Souttar back, Clement said:
“I don’t have a clue for the moment. So Dujon got a kick on his foot. He had to come off because of that. So we will see how serious the injury is.
“I don’t know if Leon will be back, and for sure not others. So we need to puzzle towards Thursday, so we will focus on that the next couple of days.”
“That will be still several weeks,” Clement said of Souttar. “He will not be back in a short time.”
Clement is trying to complete a jigsaw with half the pieces missing.
