Glasgow Rangers face their Scottish Premiership rivals at Ibrox this Wednesday.
Steven Gerrard has suggested that both Ryan Jack and Scott Arfield are unlikely to be involved in Rangers’s Scottish Cup replay on Wednesday due to injury, in comments reported by BT Sport.
Neither Arfield or Jack featured in Saturday’s goalless draw with St Johnstone in the Scottish Premiership, with Steven Davis and Glen Kamara getting the chance to start in the stalemate.
Both Arfield and Jack have arguably established themselves in Gerrard’s strongest midfield trio this term – alongside Ross McCrorie – so the manager’s update ahead of Wednesday’s replay with Kilmarnock is bound to disappoint a number of fans.
“Scott Arfield has a chance but Jack blocked a tackle at Kilmarnock last week and twisted his ankle, so he is a big doubt for Wednesday,” he said, as reported by BT Sport. “Arfield has a chance – but it’s not a good chance.
“Scott has a couple of dead legs. One of them he actually picked up before the first Kilmarnock game, so Scott wouldn’t miss a game with a dead leg. It’s more of a flush in a calf muscle.”
Jack in particular, has been superb of late. Ross McCrorie’s presence seems to have given him some freedom to make more of an impact further up the pitch.
Arfield has perhaps not made as much of an contribution as he would have liked since joining Rangers in the summer. But he unquestionably has the quality that enables him to provide a game-changing moment out of nothing.
And Rangers will arguably face a much tougher task trying to get through to the quarter-final of the competition if they are unable to call upon the two midfielders when Steve Clarke’s men come to Ibrox.
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