Philippe Clement: European Nights At Ibrox Are Special

PHILIPPE CLEMENT wants the Ibrox crowd to be the 12th man tomorrow evening as Rangers kick off the first of their four home UEFA Europa League league phase fixtures.

FCSB, Tottenham and Union St. Gilloise await the Light Blues in Govan, but Rangers will first and foremost tackle a giant of French football when Olympique Lyonnais come to town.

Ibrox is sure to be rocking and Clement hopes his side can create another special European evening in Govan.

Speaking to the media to preview tomorrow evening's encounter, boss Clement said: "Back-to-back wins in Europe this season? That would feel huge, but also winning against Lyon would be a huge thing if you see the budget they can spend on transfers.

"We will go for that, for the three points and not just for one point. We need a few players who will go above their level and have an amazing evening.

"We want this competition to compete with the best. It can only make my players better.

"They learned from the Real Betis and Benfica games and they can grow out of that.

"My team needs experiences like that to become better. It's a different kind of football also.

"It's a totally different competition than the domestic games. You need to do other things also, and it gets the best of the players and our crowd.

"The European nights are the most special and I hope to see that tomorrow.

"Of course we're also realistic about Lyon; they are a really good team and better than the teams that we faced in our group stage.

"If you see the difference in budget and the money they've spent - and I know many players from my time at Monaco - it's a different world.

"We're going to fight with our qualities against them, like we did against Real Betis and Benfica."

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021024 Training, Alex Rae, Philippe Clement & Stephan Van Der Heyden 12

Lyon are currently marooned in 11th place in the Ligue 1 table, but Clement says their league position belies the talent within their squad.

There is certainly a wealth of English Premier League experience, as well as some burgeoning youngsters attracting glances from across France.

The Gers boss says he's excited by the challenge and believes his side can reach their maximum level.

He added: "The fans love to see quality. They are demanding in that way, and they love to see quality on the other side as long as we win.

"Lyon have a lot of experience and players with really big careers such as [Alexandre] Lacazette for Arsenal, [Nemanja] Matic at Man Utd and [Corentin] Tolisso at Bayern Munich.

"They have a lot of exciting young talents such as [Rayan] Cherki who is one of the stars of French football.

"It's always exciting to see what we can show against them with our qualities.

"You need to stop the first XI and not only the guys who come on. We don't only want to be focussed on stopping them, but also to hurt them.

"They have technical qualities in the final third which can make the difference in one individual action.

"They have four or five players who can do that and have five or six players to bring on. We need to focus on the start of the game."

  


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