David Martindale fears the English Premier League’s top stars have spoiled any hopes Livingston had of catching Rangers cold this weekend.
The Lions host the Ibrox outfit in the Premiership curtain-raiser at lunch-time on Saturday and Martindale is determined to do all he can to mastermind an upset.
But the Almondvale boss reckons Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s side will be primed to hit the ground running as they bid to wrestle the top-flight title back from rivals Celtic.
Martindale might be keeping his fingers crossed that Rangers’ lack of competitive fixtures could be a positive for his side.
However, with the Light Blues, who also defeated Blackpool this summer, having defeated West Ham 3-1 and impressed in a 2-1 defeat to Spurs in recent days, the Livi manager doubts the Glasgow giants will be undercooked.
He said: “I would probably have liked them to be five or six European games into it before they came to us.
“But you can look at it two ways.
“Normally, you play the Old Firm early in the season and they’ve maybe had three or four competitive fixtures, in terms of Champions League or Europa League qualifying games.
“This year, they’ve not had that.
“But if you look at the level of opponent they’ve been able to attract, it’s probably better than the level of opponent they would have been pitting their wits against in previous years.
“I’m really, really looking forward to it. It will give us a massive gauge of where we are but I’m under no illusions how hard that’s going to be.”
Livi squeezed into the knockout stages of the Premier Sports Cup with a 2-0 victory over Kelty Hearts at the weekend.
After narrow wins against Albion Rovers and Cove Rangers and a defeat against Inverness Caley Thistle, they had to rely on results elsewhere to set up a last-16 tie with Dundee United.
And, with the sides battling out a goalless draw in August 2020, Martindale accepts he needs his side firing on all cylinders to have any chance of a shock this weekend.
He added: “They’ve come here before and we’ve made it difficult for them and we’ll make it difficult again.
“I always think you need a wee bit of luck going into these games.
“You’re probably needing three or four Rangers players to under-perform and you’re probably needing nine out of 10 from our 11 players - or maybe even 15 or 16 players.”
