LEE WILKIE: Dundee must beware wounded animal Rangers at Ibrox despite morale-boosting Ayr victory

Dundee have to beware the risk of being salvation for a Rangers side low on confidence this week.

The Dark Blues are huge underdogs when they go to Ibrox tomorrow night.

A Championship side away to last season’s Europa League finalists, the odds will be firmly stacked against Gary Bowyer’s team.

I watched Rangers against Motherwell on Sunday and, though clearly a very good outfit, they are struggling for confidence.

That might be something to try to use to your advantage but there is a big risk there, too.

Somebody soon will be on the end of a tanking from Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s side, it’s inevitable with the players they have.

Dundee don’t want to be that team.

How to avoid that

Avoiding that at Ibrox isn’t easy.

Concede an early goal and quickly the confidence flows back to the home side with the big crowd at their backs.

But, keep it tight, stay in the game and we’ve seen already the support can get anxious.

Dees won’t want to hear it but United showed how that can be done earlier in the season, they managed to play on the negativity of the crowd and almost forced a late equaliser.

After losing 7-1 to Liverpool and then scraping past Motherwell, confidence is not high among the Gers.

The question is whether Dundee can make any inroads on that.

Better place

The good thing is the Dark Blues are in a far better place themselves after a good performance and victory over Ayr at the weekend.

It was a comfortable win and will give the team real confidence after taking a bit of flak from the defeat at Cove and draw with Arbroath.

Bowyer also showed he’s a brave manager and one willing to back his players by picking the same team that drew at Gayfield.

Fans weren’t happy there weren’t changes but the Dens boss has made a lot of alterations to his starting XI all season.

That’s been a criticism as well so it was good to see a bit of consistency in team selection.

As a player I always felt big changes never really worked and the ideal is to have a settled side.

Depth

To be fair, he changed things at half-time and the subs Zach Robinson and Josh Mulligan made a real impact.

Seeing that only confirms to me my feeling that Dundee have the strongest squad in the Championship.

I look at Partick or Inverness and they have a good XI or maybe good 13 players to choose from.

But there’s not a huge amount of depth.

Dundee and Bowyer have that, players who can come on and change a game.

Now it’s about finding the consistency in performance that has eluded them at times so far this season.

The win came at a good time – it keeps them in the mix in the promotion hunt.

It also boosts confidence ahead of a really tough trip to Ibrox – whatever troubles the Gers are suffering right now, Dundee will need it.