ALLOW me to play devil’s advocate.

I have heard it said, and I’ll make the point here, that Steven Gerrard’s heart would not break should his Rangers team fail to qualify for the Europa League group stage.

There is some sense in this thinking.

He has not been lured to Ibrox to make the club a European force again, which of course would be great, at least that isn’t his priority right here and now.

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Gerrard is at Ibrox to stop Celtic winning ten in a row. He is here to make Rangers the champions of Scotland again.

And, take it from a man who knows, that task is made all the more difficult if you are playing Thursday-Sunday for at least a couple of months. The travelling can tire you, never mind the amount of minutes the top players would need to chalk up.

So, there is an argument that it would be better if Celtic were in Europe as Rangers could take advantage if they were not in that because all their focus would be on the Premiership.

This is not an argument I can agree with.

The Rangers supporters have missed out on a lot over these past years with European football being one of the biggest absences for a fan-base brought up on famous nights at Ibrox.

Sure, there will be more games, the group stage would prove to be a huge test of a yet an untested squad and there is a chance the league form could suffer.

However, not for one moment do I believe that Steven Gerrard has come to Rangers not to try to win every single game. He will want a long run in Europe. That makes money, of course, and is where he will want this Rangers team to play.

And as a former player who experienced incredible highs and lows on that stage, I’ve got to say I wouldn’t have missed any of it. Also, nobody likes training. Not really. We all much prefer playing games.

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Rangers need to be in European football. It’s as simple as that.

But funnily enough, it is the defeats in Europe which I can remember. Not the good days.

I was at Rangers when we reached a European final and during this time enjoyed some fantastic wins. Great times and all that but the memories of those games aren’t great.

At Rangers, you are expected to beat everyone. So when you do the feeling is relief more than anything else. And the next day we were back at Ibrox looking ahead to the weekend.

Ah, but it’s the defeats which I can’t quite shake off.

It was only a few months after the UEFA Cup Final in 2008, having lost the league to Celtic on the final day, when we drew at home to Kaunas of Lithuania, a team we were expected to beat.

It finished 0-0 at Ibrox, which is never great, but at 1-1 over there with just a few minutes to go in the second-leg meant we were through after a match, and I very much include myself here, we did not show up well in.

And then they scored late on. I remember that alright.

As we sat slumped in the dressing room, all of us knew we had let down the fans, the club, ourselves and the manager. I can’t remember seeing Walter Smith as angry as he was that day.

Read more: Steven Gerrard: There are no excuses for Rangers ahead of Shkupi second leg

We were left in no uncertain terms as to what we had just done, or had not done. Then when the manager was finished, we started on one another. A few harsh words were said.

This is a fresh memory. Not beating Fiorentina in Italy to get Rangers into a European final for the first time since 1972. How odd is that.

I just hope the Rangers players of today don’t carry about with them a bad memory from tonight’s game with Shkupi in Macedonia. As it so happens, I don’t think they will.

The tie isn’t dead, but Rangers were better than them, a lot better, and should be home and hosed had they taken their chances at Ibrox.

The heat will be a problem. I played in a few of those games and it’s so hard to get a breath, plus UEFA are asking too much of all the teams in the qualifiers.

In saying all of that, Rangers will score over there and will have enough quality to get through.

Hopefully, if the players are like me, this won’t be a game which gets embedded in the old memory banks.

It’s so early in the season which means judging what stage Rangers are is impossible.

However, there encouraging signs last Thursday night. True, too many chances were not taken but that can get sorted. A 2-0 win at a packed Ibrox was not a bad start for the manager.

And I believe his players will finish the job.