JAMES Tavernier insists that Rangers will ‘leave everything on the pitch’ tomorrow night as they welcome Red Bull Leipzig to a sold-out Ibrox in their Europa League semi-final second leg.
The German side carry a 1-0 lead into the second leg of the competition and the team will look to close the deficit quickly to try and reach the final of the tournament in Seville.
The captain took some time to talk about the club’s legendary and much-loved kit man, Jimmy Bell, following the devastating news of his death yesterday.
When asked at this afternoon’s pre-match press conference, he said: “It’s obviously a devastating time for the club, for everyone that knew Jimmy and for his family. Yesterday was very difficult to take, we took to our own to mourn Jimmy, but I know that he wouldn’t want the fuss.
“He’d want us to roll our sleeves up and get stuck into tomorrow, that was the standard that he set. When it comes to tomorrow, I know that everyone will be ready and go to do it for the club, fans and Jimmy.
“I loved Jimmy to bits, he was one of the first I came to see when I first joined the club. We created such a special relationship over the years so it’s a hard to take, even the boys that came in this season created special relationships with Jimmy.
“He was the heart and soul of this place, but we have to focus on the game and try and put the best performance that he would want us to do and try and reach a final where he would obviously want to go to.”
Tavernier reflected on the journey the team has had since he joined the club in 2015, and outlined that the players will give it their all as they look to progress the Europa League final tomorrow night.
He added: “Personally, it means a lot because it has been a journey. We’ve always tried to improve each year, from the board, the players and youth - we want to make the place better.
“We’re a step closer and it’d be an unbelievable achievement to reach a the final.
“There may be some nerves, but we’re playing at home in front of our 50,000 fans. It’s another really good team being put in front of us, the boys will suck it up and I know the fans will be right behind us that’s what we want and need.
“All we can do is give it our best, leave everything on that pitch and have no regrets – if we do that, then we have every fighting chance to get ourselves into a final.
“I hope out atmosphere can affect them; in the Braga game we got an early goal and that really kicked us on. We’d obviously like to replicate that and really get after them, but we’ve seen some really good teams come to Ibrox and struggle sometimes – I hope that is the case tomorrow night and we’ve just need to make it as hard as possible and do everything we can to get the result.
“We all have the same goal; we all want to be playing in Seville at the end of the season. We as players just want to make the clubs and fans proud.”
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