Rangers boss Philippe Clement hasn’t had his injury problems to seek as the club prepare to welcome Hearts in the Scottish Premiership.
Pretty much since the ex-Club Brugge and AS Monaco manager walked in through the door at Ibrox has issues in the club’s medical department hamstrung Philippe Clement and his team.
No pun intended.
With the return of Danilo levelled out by a fresh injury to Tom Lawrence, Rangers are still without talented wide players Rabbi Matondo and Oscar Cortes.
But there could be one Rangers star in line for his first appearance since August as the Jambos come to town after he was included on the bench for the midweek trip to Greece.
Ridvan Yilmaz lines up Rangers return v Hearts
It feels like every time Ridvan Yilmaz has gotten started at Rangers, injury has struck the Turkish international down.
The 23-year-old joined Rangers from Besiktas in a deal which could potentially wind up costing the Gers around £5m.
But so far Rangers have failed to get bang for their buck with Ridvan Yilmaz consistently picking up injury problems which have limited his Ibrox career to date.
This latest issue, sustained whilst taking a shot in the Champions League qualifying defeat to Dynamo Kyiv at Hampden in August, has seen the left-back miss the bulk of the season.
Stretchered off in that painful 2-0 defeat, Ridvan Yilmaz has watched on from the sidelines as the impressive Jefte has made the left-back berth his own.
But as the influence of the 20-year-old Brazilian left-back starts to wane, Rangers will be happy to see Ridvan Yilmaz back in their matchday squad.
Whilst Ridvan never got off the bench in the 1-1 Europa League draw with Olympiakos in midweek, the left-back could be in line for a return in the Scottish Premiership clash with Hearts.
Rangers must be ‘realistic’ with injury problems
As a number of Rangers player nurse injury problems, Philippe Clement was pressed on the situation at the club ahead of the Europa League clash against Olympiacos.
With Tom Lawrence joining Oscar Cortes, Rabbi Matondo, Ridvan Yilmaz and Danilo on the sidelines, the latter three players are all back in and around the first-team squad training.
Danilo made a return to the team in the Premier Sports Cup victory over Motherwell, whilst Ridvan Yilmaz is in line for minutes in the clash with Hearts.
Rabbi Matondo might even be back in the matchday squad at Ibrox, whilst Nicolas Raskin has made a strong return from a series of injury issues.
It’s a situation which Clement claims is drastically improved on last season, where Rangers had as many as 12 players out at any given time.
“We need to be realistic about (injuries),” said Clement. “I don’t think there’s one squad in the world where there are no injuries.
“That’s a utopia in periods yes, but last season we had in a lot of moments 12 players out. That’s never been the case this season.
“So there are changes made in staff, in the way of working in a lot of things, and we start to see also the benefit out of that.
“For example, John Souttar in his career never played so many minutes that he’s been doing now. Never.
“Before he always had injuries in those moments, or before already.
“There are other examples also in that way. So there are good steps made.
“We still have to make steps to make the team in general more robust so yeah, I’m happy to see some players back.
“Nico (Raskin) also last season he missed a lot of games so we’re happy that we have several of those back.
“Ridvan Yilmaz is also now training with the squad back, Rabbi (Matondo) starts to train with the squad back.
“So the more players we have back the better we will get also with every three days game because it’s a lot of pressure on the bodies that way to perform 200% every three days, so we will need all of them.”
