James Tavernier insists Rangers are in the driving seat to progress to the Europa League semi-finals.
The Rangers captain admits the San Mames Stadium is ‘beautiful,’ and that he hopes it’s not a one-time visit to the venue that will host the final of the 2025 competition next month.
Barry Ferguson’s side know they will face a difficult evening in Bilbao against a team who haven’t lost a home match since the early weeks of the season.
Having seen this movie before just three years ago, though, Tavernier reckons that run under Giovanni van Bronckhorst will help to give the Ibrox club a much-needed edge in the Basque Country.
“We're in the driving seat,” the skipper told the media. “We'll look to leave everything out on that pitch with no regrets and anyone who's asked to come on the pitch, if they're not going to start at 11, give it their all.
“That's what we'll be doing, especially with all the travelling fans coming to support us and the fans back at home.
“We obviously want to give them a night that they can remember as well.
“It's all in our hands, isn't it? You're against 11 opposition players and it's in our hands to win the game, to give them a difficult night. We only can control our own destiny and that's the main thing.
“We have to be all fully committed, really aggressive. Like I said, we'll have to suffer but suffer together as a team and then attack together as a team. When I said the driving seat, that's what I meant by that.
“We can only control our outcomes and what we do.
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“It's really important that we all play together as a team, I think that's what got us to the final this time. As a unit, as a whole team, playing together and just really working hard for one another.
“I think that's key for Thursday, doing the same like we did in the first leg, working really hard for one another, limiting their chances and just trying to keep 11 on the pitch and create chances and score.
“The lads have really stood up to the challenge against other teams in this run. We've really stuck together in games where I've not had to say much.
“The boys have really taken it upon themselves to be professional, to be mature the way they play.
“It was a credit to the team in the last game when we played with 10 men, having to suffer without the ball and going down to nine men.
“It was in the late stages of the game and Liam stayed with the penalty. The team have really thrived under these conditions.
“I'll obviously put small reminders that we'll obviously have to stick together as a team and I think the boys know that.”
The 2022 final in Seville understandably remains a source of immense pain for the 33-year-old, and plenty of his other current and former Rangers teammates.
But for an Aaron Ramsey missed penalty, or Ryan Kent’s squandered chance in the dying embers of extra-time, and Rangers’ name could’ve been engraved on the famous European trophy.
It wasn’t to be though, as Eintracht Frankfurt prevailed on a roasting hot spring evening at the Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán Stadium.
“I've still never watched a replay of the game,” Tavernier reflected honestly when asked about that night almost three years ago. “I think when I eventually hang my boots up I'll revisit it but it was obviously a hard one because it was a penalty shootout, that's something that really hurts.
“But to have that experience going all the way through the rounds and to get to the final, it’s once in a lifetime stuff.
“Obviously we have a really good chance at this stage of the season.
“We know we've got a tough opposition tomorrow, the talent that they've got throughout the team but anything's doable as long as we all stick together and really push for it.”
