CHEEKY WEE IMP TARGETS GERS
RANGERS are heading back to Gibraltar to start this term’s Europa League bid.
Steven Gerrard’s side will return to the Victoria Stadium to face Celtic’s 2016 first-leg conquerors Lincoln Red Imps just one season after visiting the venue to defeat St Joseph’s.
Aberdeen and Motherwell have also been drawn away from home in the one-off second qualifying round shootout with the Dons heading for Norway to face Viking and Well in Northern Ireland to meet Coleraine. Rangers, who exited last
season’s competition at the last-16 stage to Bayer Leverkusen, will go head to head against Red Imps after the Gibraltarian minnows won their spot at this stage by defeating Titus Petange of Luxembourg.
Lee Casciaro, who bagged the famous winner for his team four years ago against Brendan Rodgers’ side before they lost the second leg 3-0 in Glasgow, was on target again in that first qualifying round win.
Derek McInnes’ Dons, who thumped Faroese side NSI Runavik to progress from round one, are heading across the North Sea for a tie in Norway for the first time.
Viking are deep into their league season but are having a poor term and currently sit in 10th position with just five wins from 16 matches.
Motherwell manager Stephen Robinson faces opposition from his home country for the second successive round.
The Fir Park side hammered Glentoran 5-1 in the opening round and have now been pitched into a tie against Coleraine, who are managed by former St Mirren manager Oran Kearney.
Kearney’s team produced a magnificent result in the first round when they won away from home on penalties against Maribor in Slovenia and all second-round ties are scheduled to be played on September 17.
Rangers, Aberdeen and Motherwell will go into the pots again today for the third qualifying round draw where they will be joined by Celtic, who dropped out of the Champions League six days ago when losing to Ferencvaros.
The Hoops were in with a two-in-10 chance of receiving a bye into the play-off round but lost out and their name will go into the hat this afternoon.