FOCUS ON AIK

MANAGER

Rikard Norling has good memories of Scotland. He led his Malmo side to a 1-0 win at Ibrox in a Champions League qualifier in 2011 before sealing a 2-1 aggregate victory which proved a major financial blow to their opponents in the season which ended with Rangers being consigned to liquidation. His next trip to Scotland proved just as memorable as Malmo inflicted a 7-0 thrashing of Hibernian at Easter Road. The 48-year-old was a youth-team colleague of ex-celtic defender and assistant manager Johann Mjallby, but was forced to quit playing at the age of 21 because of a back injury. He quickly embarked on a coaching career which has taken him to AIK three times, with the latter two spells as manager.

PLAYERS

Sebastian Larsson is the most familiar face in the AIK squad with 113 Sweden caps to his name. The 34-year-old midfielder returned to Sweden last summer after 17 years in England with Arsenal, Birmingham, Sunderland and Hull. AIK also have experience up front in the shape of Henok Goitom, pictured, who spent several years in Spain with the likes of Murcia, and Iceland striker Kolbeinn Sigthorsson, who netted against England in Euro 2016 and was linked with a move to Celtic after facing them for Ajax in the Champions League.

TACTICS

AIK have had a reputation for being strong defensively over the past couple of years with a three-man central defence and are likely to threaten mainly on the counter-attack.

EUROPEAN PEDIGREE

The 12-times Swedish champions are competing in Europe for the sixth consecutive season, but have not qualified for a group stage since 2012-13 when they beat CSKA Moscow to make the Europa League proper. Their only previous trip to Scotland ended with a 3-0 defeat by Dundee United in the 1984-85 Uefa Cup with goals from Paul Sturrock and Ralph Milne (two) overturning a 1-0 first-leg defeat for Jim Mclean’s

European specialists.

FORM

The Swedish champions are third in the Allsvenskan, four points behind Djurgarden with 20 games played. They suffered a major blow on Sunday when Norling’s decision to rest several players backfired in a 2-1 home defeat by struggling Kalmar. AIK lost to Maribor on away goals in this season’s Champions League qualifiers before beating Sheriff of Moldova 3-2 on aggregate in their first Europa League tie.