Rangers won’t rush Jordan Rossiter’s return to action

GRAEME MURTY is refusing to set any deadline for Jordan Rossiter returning from injury.

The Rangers manager could certainly do with the talents of the former Liverpool man in the Light Blues midfield.

But he has made only a handful of appearances since joining the Ibrox side in 2016.

The 20-year-old believed he had overcome a knee injury at the start of this season, but broke down again after only four matches.

Murty says the player doesn’t need the added pressure of trying to get fit for a specific date.

He explained: “He is going through a hard time – physically and psychologically.

“What we want to do is take away any performance anxiety or any other stresses that he has, so that he keeps his focus on getting his body right.

“Part of the way to do that is to take away time limits, and put him in a positive place.

“He’s not progressing as fast as we would like or, I’m sure, he would like.

“If you give Kenny Miller a timeline, he would do everything he can do to chase that down because that’s his psyche.

“But because Jordan has had a harder time of it over the last couple of years, putting that time, or that date, in the forefront of his mind might lead him to fixate on that rather than listening to his body.

“And we just want him to get his body right. And when he gets his body right, then we will see him play.”

Murty has seen Rossiter at close quarters and has no doubt about his quality.

He went on: “Having been injured for 18 months myself, I know the monotony of it.

“So we need to make sure we give him a variety of different ways to be stimulated.

“We have different coaching staff around him all the time.

“I’m hopeful we can get him fit because if we do, then we’ve got a really, really good asset.

“Jordan deals with the football really well.

“He passes the ball brilliantly and has a fantastic pedigree.

“He played for us at Nuneaton in pre-season with my Under-20 team, and I had a couple of training sessions with him.

“When you see him up close, the sound he makes when passing the ball, just from a simple sidefoot, is different. There’s just a resonance to it that’s great.

“It’s similar to a golf pro hitting a shot. It makes that wonderful sound.

“It sounds totally different when we amateurs clang it down the fairway, and slap it a wee bit.

“I want him to have that in the forefront of his mind. That feeling of that’s what I want.”