Problems ease for Gers

Smith has seen his squad stretched to the limit by injury and suspension in recent weeks, even failing to fill the bench with a full complement of substitutes against Hamilton recently.Saturday's clash with Hearts saw Rangers start with two 18-year-olds - John Fleck and Danny Wilson - while naming four youngsters on the bench, including Andrew Little, whose last-gasp strike rescued a point for the Scottish champions.However, Smith has revealed the squad that will make the short trip to Paisley should have a more familiar look, with the return of Kenny Miller, Steven Naismith and Nacho Novo, as well as Pedro Mendes, who was an unused substitute on Saturday."The news is a little bit brighter," said the Rangers boss."If the injuries had been spread over sections of the team, it would be fine."But the injuries were to almost every one of our front and attacking players and that was a problem."That affected us a bit on Saturday and had done in two or three of the previous games as well."The creation of opportunities maybe hasn't been as good as it had been before."With those returning from injury likely to be short of match fitness, Smith's problem now is when to introduce them into the action again.He added: "That's one of the problems we have, to try to fit them back into the team, and we have to be very careful with that aspect of it."They will all be fit to start but whether we will start them all at the one time is doubtful."We have to be careful not to play too many who have been out for a period of time all at the one time."It will mean a little bit of juggling of selection so they can ease themselves back in. I have to try to achieve a decent balance in that respect."However, some key personnel remain unavailable, with Kris Boyd recovering from a hernia operation and Madjid Bougherra still on international duty in the African Nations Cup.Asked whether he had been hoping for an early Algeria exit from the tournament, Smith smiled: "It's hard for anyone in football to say they would be pleased to see them getting knocked out."But, in a word, yes!"It would have meant us having Madjid Bougherra back."But, when you take a player from one of the African Nations, you know that, every couple of years, you are going to be confronted with this problem."On the one hand, you want to see your players doing well but we could also do with having him back with the number of fixtures we've got."However, we wish him well and hope he carries on and gets to the final if need be."Smith has been forced to rely heavily on the products of the Murray Park youth system in recent weeks.But he was keen to stress his desire to see homegrown talent remain at Rangers is not simply down to the club's financial plight and inability to recruit new players."I don't think it's got anything to do with the financial situation," he said."We have a good set-up at Murray Park and we would hope that any younger player we have coming through would be a benefit to the team."We want them to come through from the youth set-up to the first team."They are young and are gaining experience every time they play and hopefully they will stay with us."

Source: Team_Talk