Philippe Clement is looking for Rangers to do “something special” when they visit Old Trafford on Thursday night.
The Belgian boss was speaking after a Cyriel Dessers hat-trick and goals from Clinton Nsiala and Ross McCausland gave the Light Blues a comfortable 5-0 Scottish Gas Scottish Cup fourth-round win over Highland League club Fraserburgh at Ibrox.
Clement will now start preparing for the resumption of European football and, after taking 11 points from the first six fixtures, the Light Blues are probably assured of a Europa League play-off spot.
They will hope to reach the last 16 without going through the next round of knockout matches, with Manchester United their next opponents before the final league phase game against Union St Gilloise.
Clement said: “I want pressure. I want pressure on the team. I want my team to be ambitious.
“And if we are somewhere, that we have higher ambitions to make it better. So, that’s what we’re going to do.
“The team has worked really hard to be in a good position in this Europa League.
“We know what Manchester United is. We know their level.
“But we’re going to go there to fight and to show ourselves and to do something really special.
“That’s our ambition, to go there and to do something special.”
Despite scoring a hat-trick to take his tally for the season to 16, Dessers’ future at Ibrox remains unclear.
The 30-year-old former Feyenoord player has dropped behind Hamza Igamane, who was rested, and the injured Danilo in the pecking order and has been linked with Leganes, St Etienne, Cagliari and Empoli in this transfer window.
Dessers was quoted in Dutch publication VI as saying: “I’m at a great club, but I’m 30 years old and want to play every week. Preferably at Rangers. If there are different feelings about that internally, then we need to talk.”
Asked if he hopes that Dessers stays at Rangers, Clement said: “It’s a difficult question.
“If Cyriel goes, you need to replace him. And it needs to be at least the same quality.
“If a player stays and he plays less and he becomes, because of that, unhappy and goes down his level – what I don’t fear with him – it’s also not good for the club.
“So, we will see in the next two weeks what happens.
“I know if he’s here, he will give everything for the club.
“We talk all the time. I think Cyriel shows that he has desire to do everything for this club. And, of course, he wants to play every game.
“It’s showing that you’re the best. He knows that really well. So, that’s the situation for the moment.”
“Cyriel is a really great character to have in the dressing room, in the team.
“He always works hard. Of course, he’s not happy if he cannot get more minutes like he had in the past to play that many minutes. But that’s football at the highest level.”
There was a crowd of 36,276 at Ibrox which included 1800 away fans and, with the game also live on television, Fraserburgh enjoyed a good payday.
However, boss Mark Cowie insists memories of the trip to Glasgow mean more to him than money.
He said: “We’re a different club to most, you saw that with the young kids we put on at the end.
“We’re heavily invested in our youth system and even if I wanted to go and sign players for X amount it wouldn’t be in the club’s ethos to do it.
“We might sign one or two but we’ve got a policy in place to allow youngsters to come through.
“It was brilliant and I’m sure we’ll have the calculator ready at some stage.
“Financially it’s great, but memories and being here as a group is probably more important to us.
“I’ve tried to keep my emotions in check, but even walking out when the stadium was empty and hearing about how many might turn up the occasion just hits you.
“I can’t prepare players for that, it’s something they have to experience.
“The way we’ve been treated by Rangers has been unbelievable and it’s been an unbelievable experience.
“Would it be asking for too much to get it again next year?”
