Rangers FC won their first qualifying round of the Europa League beating FC Shkupi on an aggregate score of 2-0 and will now face Croatian side Osijek in the second qualifying round.
The Gers will travel to Croatia at the end of this week to take on Osijek in the first leg at the Gradski stadium and before the match, Steven Gerrard might have a major injury concern.
Summer signing Scott Arfield missed the second leg against FC Shkupi last week due to an injury he had sustained during the first leg at Ibrox and now the Light Blues manager has revealed that the midfielder is yet to recover fully.
Rangers midfielder Scott Arfield is "improving slowly" but may still miss Rangers' Europa League meeting with Osijek.
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— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) July 20, 2018
At first, was being believed that the 29-year-old would fully recover from the injury and will make it to the first eleven vs Osijek but now Gerrard has revealed that he is ‘not sure’ if Scott Arfield can make himself fit.
Arfield is one of the key members of the new look Gerrard side for the upcoming season and his absence during the Europa League clash might be a big blow for the Glasgow outfit.
Talking about Scott Arfield’s return, Gerrard said: “We will have to play that one by ear and see if he improves in the coming days,”
But all is not gloomy for Steven Gerrard in the injury front as left-wing back Declan John is expected to be back in contention for the Osijek clash after recovering from a back injury.
Like Scott Arfield, Declan too was an absentee during the second leg game vs Shkupi which led many to believe that the 23-year-old is being prepared to be sold off.
But it was later revealed that John was suffering from a back injury as a result of which he could not train for a number of days.
Now though, the Gers boss has claimed that the left-wing back is back in full training and will likely feature during the Osijek clash.
“Declan John is back in full training. He trained yesterday and had no issues with his back problem which he had,” Gerrard said.
“Besides that everyone is fine, Lee Wallace has done a bit of pitch based stuff and Graham Dorrans is pushing each day to improve his fitness levels. Jordan Rossiter will still be a little while yet.”
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