Rangers wary of pitfalls as Europe millions beckon

So Rangers know about the pitfalls of facing minnows and with Celtic's recent European embarrassment to Artmedia Bratislava still fresh in Glaswegian minds, the Rangers manager, Alex McLeish, has stressed he is not complacent.

"The most important thing for us is to be professional," he said, aware that a £10m windfall for reaching the group stages is at stake. "We need to be at our very best. A score draw would be satisfactory."

Rangers were underwhelming in winning 1-0 on Saturday at Inverness Caledonian Thistle, but McLeish has no injury concerns and an unchanged starting line-up is possible. Tonight's game is not at Anorthosis' home ground in Larnaca, which has inadequate floodlights, but at the 23,400-seat Neo GSP Stadium in Nicosia, which has more than double the capacity.

The Anorthosis player-coach, Temuri Ketsbaia, is familiar to Rangers' fans from his playing days at Dundee. His side were one of the surprise victors in the second qualifying round, beating Turkey's Trabzonspor 3-2 on aggregate. Another triumph would make Anorthosis the first Cypriot team to reach the Champions' League proper.

"We have a very difficult mission but we can make history," Ketsbaia said. "Trabzonspor are better than Rangers in terms of quality and technical football but Rangers are a very powerful and passionate side."

Possible teams: Rangers (4-4-2): Waterreus; Ricksen, Andrews, Pierre-Fanfan, Murray; Novo, Rae, Ferguson, Lovenkrands; Buffel, Prso.

Anorthosis Famagusta (4-4-2): Georgallides; Louka, Markou, Poursaitidis, Xenidis; Ketsbaia, Haxhi, Nikolaou, Kinkladze; Frousos, Tsitaishvili.

Referee: F De Bleeckere (Belgium).

The lowdown on... Anorthosis

The Cypriot champions' player-manager, Temuri Ketsbaia, is one of only two full-time professionals on their books, the other being fellow midfielder Georgi Kinkladze. Klimenti Tsitaishvili is a threat up front, while Rangers might also be wary of the passing abilities of the captain, Nikos Nikolaou, in central midfield. Ketsbaiadescribed his side's second qualifying round win, 3-2 on aggregate over the Turkish runners-up Trabzonspor, as "probably the greatest result in Cypriot football history". But even Ketsbaia,who has an annual budget of about £600,000, knows his team start as outsiders.