3 remaining Scot sides get their European Draws

By: Ian Rose | August 31st, 2007

Well, Pars are out thanks to a pair of lackluster (to put it kindly) matches against Hacken, but three Scottish sides remain in European competition, with Celtic and Rangers both in the Champions League and Aberdeen in the UEFA Cup. Here are their draws:

Celtic
JT’s right – this is going to be a tough group. Champions League Group D features defending champion AC Milan, Benfica, Celtic and Shakhtar Donetsk. I actually don’t think it’s a terrible draw for Celtic. They don’t have to win the group, which would be a monumental task against Milan – they just need to finish second, and Benfica are a team that Celtic has beaten. Obviously, they will need to take some points on the road, which has been an issue, but I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that Celtic will take second in the group and move on.

Rangers
Ouch. Anyone coming into the Champions League from the fourth pot of contenders would have a tough run at going on in the competition, but Rangers got what I think is the toughest of the groups. Barcelona has, literally, more superstar forwards than they know what to do with, and the other two groupmates just happen to be the defending champions of France and Germany. Rangers have been on an impressive run so far, and they’ll do decently at Ibrox, I think, but I just can’t see them finishing higher than third in this group.

Aberdeen
The Dons, now Scotland’s sole representative in the UEFA Cup, has gotten a pretty decent first round draw. They’ll face Dnipro from Ukraine, and their resident Zidane look-alike, Serhii Nazarenko. Aberdeen’s going to have to find the net a bit more than they’ve done in the SPL so far this season, with their leading scorer having just left to take over the reins at Inverness. Coach Oleg Protasov’s Dnipro side will attack, early and often. My heart says “Aberdeen”, but my head says “Dnipro”. As usual, I’ll go with the advice of the stupider of the competing organs, and say Aberdeen in a very close tie.