Mention of Rangers’ Champions League conquerors Malmo might be enough to incite PTSD in supporters given just how big a dent it put in this season early on but Chelsea have put the final nail in the Swedish club’s Euro campaign coffin.
We’ve slowly began to recover from the disappointment of the untimely Champions League exit which was as heart-breaking in football terms as it was financial.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvKOEsh5-Xo
A reported £30m – at least – fell by the wayside with that 4-2 aggregate loss and throwing the second leg away 1-0 up against 10 men at halftime took a while to recover from.
Plenty of Gers fans probably still haven’t.
A Europa League campaign has since followed and whilst Rangers are still in with a shout of knockout round qualification in the competition, Malmo are suffering quite different fortunes in European football’s elite competition.
Chelsea knock Rangers conquerors Malmo out of the Champions League
The Swedish Champions are officially out of the competition following a 1-0 defeat to current holders Chelsea and have yet to register a goal in the competition.
Drawing a remarkably tough group in the Premier League side, Italian giants Juventus and Russian club Zenit St Petersburg, Jon Dahl Tomasson’s team was always going to be up against it.
But in four matches the club has conceded 12 goals without reply in a Champions League run which shows the ruthlessness of the competition.
The 1-0 defeat to Chelsea at home is their most valiant performance of the campaign but even this bred little reward as the club face two dead rubbers to come against Juve and Zenit.
Malmo will be laughing all the way to the bank however and given the scale of opposition such as Chelsea this would’ve been a difficult group for Rangers.
But you can’t help but feel that had we properly given a good account of ourselves against the Swedes that we would’ve made a better fist of things in the competition than Malmo ever could.
Meanwhile Rangers are back in Europa League action after a thumping victory over Motherwell at Fir Park as Steven Gerrard confirmed a potential Ibrox boost in Denmark.
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