The former Belgium international secured qualification for the World Cup in the stadium where he will lead his new side out.
Philippe Clement admits he has no other choice but to slot a square peg into a round hole in Prague.
But the Rangers boss insists he’s confident the club’s crisis at left-back won’t see their Europa League prospects turn pear-shaped. The Belgian has flown out for his first European clash in charge without a natural pick to slot in on the left-hand side of his defence after Borna Barisic picked up a thigh issue during the gaffer’s debut win over Hibs.
“You can keep on talking and being negative but someone else needs to come in and do a job for the team. I expect everyone to attack together and to defend together. In this position you have different things to do, attacking and defending. I want that mindset from my players, especially when someone has to step in in a different way from before. I am confident with my squad.”
Barisic limped off just 15 minutes into the 4-0 hammering of Hibs before Yilmaz was called off the bench. Beale’s decision to leave the Turk off the Euro list has come back to bite Clement. But the boss is hopeful the situation will have resolved itself by the time Edinburgh’s other representatives visit on Sunday. He said: “We hope to get Borna back by the weekend to face Hearts or next week, so it’s not a big one.
“But, of course, the timing is bad because Ridvan is not on this European list. That is a decision that was made before my time, so I cannot do anything about it. It’s a white page, it’s a new story for all the players getting their chances. I don’t look back to what happened a few weeks or months ago because it’s not important any more. Those decisions are made, I don’t know what information or what ideas [were behind them], it’s not important. I have a lot of things to do at the moment. It has been a busy week and I am focused on the future of this team, not on the past.”
Rangers put on their best display of the season as they swept past Hibs. But Clement knows his new charges will have to shine even brighter if they are to get a result in the Golden City. The former international has already experienced one gleaming moment at the Letna Stadium and he’s desperate to savour another. He said: “It’s evenings like this I love – all the vibe around these European games, travelling to different places and different stadiums.
“I also had a very good feeling earlier when I went on to the pitch. I just said to Todd Cantwell, I had forgotten until I came into the stadium when I recognised it. It was here 20 years ago when we qualified for the 2002 World Cup with Belgium. Those things give you something special for nights like this. But we need to show a better level than on Saturday because this is a better team.
“Sparta are really good on the ball with good quality players, good structure and a good coach also. It’s a home game for Sparta, so that’s also different. We need to have the whole team on their toes. But I saw good signals over the last two days in training. Everybody is up for a great European evening and we know for those nights you have to be very focused, very concentrated and you need to take your moment.
“I want us to be a team who try to be dominant every game, even against teams who are better than us. We have qualities in the squad. Of course, it is the beginning of the story but I see players with a good focus in training and in meetings also. When we explain which way we want to go, they try to do the right things on the pitch and off also. I hope to create a story as fast as possible together, to make it as strong as possible. In the next two weeks we have six games, so it’s going to be hard and we’ll need the squad fit, need players fit so we can make good rotation and in every second of the game we can be sharp.”