Article body analysed
Jack Butland returned to the Rangers line-up at Old Trafford Europa League: Rangers v Union Saint-Gilloise Venue: Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow Date: Thursday, 30 January Kick-off: 20: 00 GMT Coverage: Listen on BBC Radio Scotland Extra & Sounds, live text commentary on the BBC Sport website & app Jack Butland says he has been able to "move on" from his own goal at Old Trafford as he seeks to help Rangers secure the best possible Europa League outcome against Union Saint-Gilloise. Butland's own goal gave Manchester United the lead in Rangers' last league phase fixture last week, with Bruno Fernandes scoring an added-time winner after Cyriel Dessers' equaliser at Old Trafford. The Ibrox side know a win against USG on Thursday guarantees them a seeded play-off spot in the next round of the Europa League and may yet be enough to clinch a top-eight place and automatic qualification for the last 16. "The life of a keeper is a very unforgiving one, " said England cap Butland, 31. "There's maximum punishment, you know, I look back at that situation and that goal in particular and I look at what I did and what I did was trying to be positive, on the front foot, trying to help the team out, and I made the right decision to come, just executed it not in the way that I wanted to. "So, if you're able to look at it like that with games coming thick and fast, you can quite easily move on. Doesn't mean you forget about it, but you can take comfort in the fact that you were trying to do the right things. "You're trying to be positive and you're trying to help out and then look at the good stuff that I did do. For large parts, if not the majority of it, I didn't put a foot wrong. " Butland had missed all of Rangers' previous January fixtures after being admitted to hospital with a leg injury during the festive period. "Never nice to be away from the team, just on a personal note, playing or not, it's just never nice to be injured, so I'm glad that's sort of behind me now and yeah, looking forward, " he said. "A common injury that I suppose developed into probably the worst case scenario, so it was a really sudden and unexpected thing. One that, thankfully we got on top of very quick. "The doctors here and the physios here as well as the guys at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital were brilliant on that New Year. Probably a faster than most expected sort of recovery and that's credit to all the guys that have helped out and me doing everything I possibly could to get back as quick as I could. " And he added: "It was a recurrence of an injury from, like, sort of five days before. So, anyone familiar with the dead leg, it sounds quite innocuous at times, but essentially it's an internal bleed, not the life threatening one that seemed to leak around on social media that forced us to have to come out and cover that. "But I'd hit it again. So, it ended up bleeding and not stopping so ended up being one that that essentially grew and grew and grew and in the pressure my leg grew and my quad at the time was a few jean sizes bigger than what it should have been, so it can get scary at that point. "That's why hospital was involved, because if it doesn't stop bleeding, then it goes down the operation route and it's messy and all the rest of it. But thankfully it was one that's then quite simple, but stubborn to get through. " BBC Radio Scotland commentator Alasdair Lamont Union Saint-Gilloise have established themselves as a force in Belgian football with a third-placed finish and another runners-up position since they last faced Rangers in 2022, as well as a first major trophy in almost 90 years as they claimed the Belgian Cup at the end of last season. But it all looked like it was going wrong at the beginning of this campaign. Cup-winning manager Alexander Blessin departed for St Pauli and was replaced by former player Sebastien Pocognoli in his first senior management role. It all began well enough for the Belgium international as he bagged the Super Cup in his first game in charge against the mighty Club Brugge, followed by an away draw and home win in his first couple of league games. Things began to unravel when they faced Slavia Prague in a Champions League qualifier. A 3-1 away defeat and 1-0 home loss knocked them out, with a first league reverse against Westerlo sandwiched in between. Though they recovered to beat Charleroi in their next league game, they would go on to win just one of their next 11 games, including a poor start to the Europa League, losing at Fenerbahce and Midtjylland along with a goalless home draw against Bodo/Glimt. Some clubs might have binned the rookie manager at that stage, but USG kept faith with Pocognoli and things began to improve from the end of October. Just one cup defeat in 18 games since then has them back in the top three and three wins on the bounce in the Europa League show they are in good fettle coming to Ibrox. Read more Rangers were without injured players Vaclav Cerny, Neraysho Kasanwirjo, John Souttar, Dujon Sterling and Ridvan Yilmaz for Sunday's Scottish Premiership win over Dundee United. Recent first-team regulars Ianis Hagi and Clinton Nsiala are not in Rangers' European squad, along with injured attackers Oscar Cortes and Danilo and January signing Rafael Fernandes. USG are without injured duo Sofiane Boufal and Alessio Castro-Montes and forward Promise David, who is not in their European squad, while defenders Christian Burgess and Koki Machida are suspended. However, defender Kevin Mac Allister returns from a ban. Rangers manager Philippe Clement: "Yeah, it's a tough team to beat. It's a very physical team. They play on the front foot, they play always with two strikers, one very creative guy behind, they play with wing-backs who are very offensive. "They're very fast in transitions, really good on set pieces. They're very direct in their play also, but they can keep also the ball into the midfield. So, there are a lot of good qualities there. " Last Updated 27th January 2025 at 09: 19 Please Note: All times UK. Tables are subject to change. The BBC is not responsible for any changes that may be made. UEFA Europa League All competitions All competitions All competitions Rangers have won all six of their home games against Belgian sides in all competitions by an aggregate score of 20-7. Their most recent such match was a 3-0 win over Union Saint-Gilloise in qualifying for the 2022-23 UEFA Champions League. Union Saint-Gilloise have lost three of their four meetings with Scottish opponents in all competitions, with the exception being a 2-0 home win against Rangers in August 2022. Rangers have only lost two of their 18 home group/league phase games in the UEFA Europa League (W10 D6), with both coming to Lyon in September 2021 (0-2) and October 2024 (1-4). Union Saint-Gilloise have won three of their last five away major European matches (L2), as many as they’d managed in their first 16 such games (W3 D4 L9). Franjo Ivanovic has scored a brace in both of Union Saint-Gilloise’s last two UEFA Europa League games, giving him four goals overall. Only Victor Boniface (6) and Roger Van Cauwelaert (5) have more in major European competition for the club. © 2025 BBC. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking.