G’day. Welcome to our live coverage of this morning’s Europa League clash between Ange Postecoglou’s struggling, injury-smashed Tottenham Hotspur and Rangers, the club he used to torment a couple of years ago, at Ibrox in Glasgow. I’m Vince Rugari and I’m here to take you through all the action. Kick-off is at 7am AEDT and you can watch this one on Stan Sport – which I’m pretty sure I have to tell you is owned by Nine, who also own this masthead.
This is a huge game for Spurs on a number of levels. They’ve won just one of their last seven matches in all competitions, a horrible run which has piled huge pressure on Postecoglou – some fans want him sacked now, others reckon he’s hanging by a thread… a run of results like that is simply unsustainable for a club like this at this level, so things need to turn around, and ideally, it will happen here, this morning.
The other reason why this is an important game is because of the Europa League table. There are 36 teams on it and Spurs sit 10th as things stand. They need to be in the top eight to directly qualify for the knockout phase without the rigmarole of a play-off to get there. And with only two matches to come after this one, three points here are essential, and frankly expected for a Premier League side in Scotland. Despite Rangers’ stature as a club, they’re not having a great time of it in the Scottish Premiership right now; they’re third, 11 points adrift of top-placed Celtic and two behind Aberdeen. Their coach, Philippe Clement, is also under pressure.
And yes, that brings us back to Glasgow. This is Postecoglou’s first time back there since leaving Celtic a year and a half ago to join Tottenham. I’m sure the Rangers fans will give him a lovely warm welcome.
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