JUST about everyone in society has had to overcome a number of challenges in the last four months – and the same can be said for the Rangers first-team.
Since playing against Leverkusen in the Europa League on March 12, the Light Blues’ players have been set a rigorous programme of work by Head of Performance Jordan Milsom to ensure that when they did return to the Rangers Training Centre, they were in as good a condition as possible.
Dr Milsom has this week been speaking exclusively to RangersTV, and he explained how every individual player’s needs were taken into account when creating a bespoke programme specifically tailored for their requirements.
He said: "At the outset, we were unsure how it was going to pan out. We played against Leverkusen on the 12th of March, and from that point, we decided quite early, based on some of the reports from UEFA, to give the lads their off-season at that point, so we had a four week off-season which would look like that a normal off-season looks like.
"Then we were just waiting and waiting, so we decided to use that period as an opportunity with the players rather than focusing on the negatives.
"So pretty-much every player in the squad has some profile and needs - so areas that they can be better at. But, one of our problems is we play so many games so the ability to focus on those areas are diminished.
"So even though we might be trying to improve players' certain qualities, games are the most important thing so the ability to adapt to those areas are probably slowed down.
"So this gave us an opportunity to really focus on those areas, so we have devised programmes that were very individual, we looked at where the players were in the world, what they had access to and what their laws were in their area, and based on that, tried to make a programme which fitted the areas they needed to focus on most.
"It was also about trying to accelerate those gains so that when we did actually get back to being a team again, their athletically in a better condition than what they were prior to the lockdown.
"So there were a lot of challenges in-terms of putting those programmes together, evaluating them as the weeks were going by and liaising with the players to ensure that they were able to do what we wanted them to do and the level we wanted them to do it."
That last game against Leverkusen brought to an end a hectic period of games, with at least a further 10 still to come before the proposed end of the season.
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Milsom, however, was pleased with the condition of the players, and continued: "At the time, it was our 53rd game. There is always a bit of disparity in the squad as you will have players who have played week-in, week-out and you will have players who will be on the fringes of that and you will have players who aren't getting any game time at all.
"Naturally, that would always exist within most squads who were playing the amount of games we were playing, but the players were in as good a condition to cope with what they were coping with, which was a game every three to four days, which is what they have had to endure from pretty-much the middle of July until the middle of March."
Milsom also reflected on both the positives and negatives of this unusual pre-season situation where the players have been able to enjoy an extended break and also much longer on the training pitch with their coaches than they normally would prior to the competitive matches starting.
"We normally come off a shorter off-season and a shorter pre-season,” he added, “and now we have effectively had a longer off-season and a longer pre-season.
"So I think the longer pre-season was important as the first few weeks didn't really look like pre-season.
"So our pre-season now is maybe 20-25 per-cent more than what it normally is. So there can be benefits - the coaches will get more time to technically and tactically work with the squad more than what we would typically get.
"But there are other implications around the volume of friendly games that you can get and the challenges that come with that so I think there are pros and cons to both situations."