Red Star a mystery to Smith

12 April 2012

Walter Smith admits Rangers face a venture into the unknown on Tuesday night when they host a Red Star Belgrade side who have suffered internal turmoil in recent days.

The Serbian champions parted company with coach Bosko Djurovski last week following their unconvincing efforts to progress past Levadia Tallinn in their last Champions League qualifier and former coach Milorad Kosanovic was installed as his replacement.

But Smith confesses he is now unsure of what to expect from their new boss, saying: "It's a little bit difficult for us to sum them up at the moment after they changed their manager. We have a good knowledge of their players on an individual basis, but their formation and the manner in which they will play is difficult for us to try to assess."

He added: "We have a rough idea how they are going to set out their stall but there will be a little bit of guesswork involved in that because they have a new coach.

"We really just have to concentrate on our own players. We have a home game and the onus is on us to impose ourselves on the game and get the win that we're looking for."

Like Smith at Rangers, Kosanovic returns to the helm of the Serbian champions following a previous spell at the club in the mid-1990s.

Despite their domestic campaign opening with an uninspiring stalemate, he has vowed to go for goals at Ibrox ahead of the return leg at Belgrade's imposing Marakana stadium.

However, Smith was unmoved by those claims, saying: "I don't think the coach is going to tell us exactly how they are going to play.

"We all come out with that one - everyone says they are going to attack whether they are or not. We just have to wait and see.

"The away games are slightly easier to handle in the sense of knowing the importance of getting the away goal."

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