Rapid Vienna vs Rangers Predictions

The Ibrox-club have been pretty shaky as of late with some extremely uncertain results halting what as turning out to be such an impressive run. Rangers were just kicking into gear under Gerrard before they faced Aberdeen two weeks ago. They had gone unbeaten in eight league games with big wins over Hearts, Livingston and a 7-1 thrashing of Motherwell being the highlights in this streak of positive results.

However, their loss at home to Aberdeen has slightly stopped them in their tracks as a variety of discipline problems have plagued their last few matches. It was a very tetchy game as Scott McKenna opened the scoring on seven minutes, setting up a 90 minutes filled with cards as tensions drew close to boiling over. Nine cards were shown in the match with Aberdeen’s Sam Cosgrove and Rangers’ Alfredo Morelos both picking up two as the two strikers failed to leave an imprint on the scoresheet.

Rangers dominated the game as they had the ball for 64% of the time and got four shots on target but they just couldn’t put the ball in the back of the net with Morelos’ attacking presence lacking for the last half hour following his dismissal with no one really filling the gap. This was a sickening defeat for Rangers as they lost for the second time to the Dons this season and for the first time at home under Gerrard. They looked pretty toothless in contrast to their domination and this continued in their latest match as relegation battler Dundee held them to a 1-1 draw at Dens Park.

This should have been an easy win for this Rangers side but they really didn’t turn up with Morelos being sorely missed up front. The Colombian will be available for this match though as they aim to progress to the Europa League knockout stage but the ‘Gers will be without Daniel Candeias who was sent off against Spartak in their 4-3 loss.

Rapid Wien have been pretty disappointing in the league this season after last year’s 3rd place finish but have shown slight signs of improvement in the past few games. Their dramatic 2-1 win over Spartak Moscow last time out in the Europa League was massive and has given them a bit of confidence to push forward but they haven’t capitalised on it enough as their performances have been lacklustre under new manager Dietmar Kuehbauer.

The Austrian has only been in the job for two months but Wien have continued this average vein of form under the former-Sociedad man. They are unbeaten in their last three but this doesn’t tell the full story as they needed two late goals to beat bottom club Spartak plus showed nothing exciting in their win over Wacker. The relegation battlers usually get thrashed by Wien with results including 4-0 and 3-0 wins in recent history but Rapid could only get the single goal past this average side in the 92nd minute. They were disappointing again at the weekend as they drew 0-0 with Sturm which doesn’t set this game up well for them.

Rangers have already beaten Rapid in the Europa League with a 3-1 win in October edging this fixture in the Blues’ favour despite both teams’ poor form. Rangers have only won two of their last five away matches and are still to win on the road in the Europa League but Rapid haven’t been much better with just two wins in their last six at the Allianz Stadion. Rapid haven’t been fantastic in front of goal recently with five in their last six while Rangers have scored 13 in the same period although they looked poor offensively against Aberdeen and Dundee. Morelos will return to the starting eleven for this match which will be such a pivotal factor of the Bears’ performance here and we think that will be enough to carry them over the line. Tensions will be high as both sides try to progress but with Wien looking pretty poor against some average sides recently, we’re going to edge this one towards Rangers for a 1-0 victory with the Colombian striker a key part of the win.