Fully fit squad and it’s go, go Goss

The Annan manager is full of belief that his team can do themselves and the 1100 travelling fans proud. And he has been handed a further boost after it was announced that Goss had been recalled from his loan at East Fife.

Gibson said: “This week there was a good buzz and a good feeling round about training. Everyone has trained well and everyone’s dying to play in the game.

“Having a fully fit squad as well, there is plenty of competition for places and it makes my job harder come team selection.

“Obviously, the game itself and the excitement around it is slightly different (to other games).

“But you’re going out there to do a job. So, I’ve told the boys to go out and enjoy it, work hard and do the things we’ve been working on. Play the way we’ve been playing and stick together, because we know it’s going to be tough, we won’t get it all our own way and we know Rangers are going to have the majority of possession.

“But we’ve also got a good belief in the squad that we can go there and put a decent performance in.”

Several players in Annan’s squad have experience playing in front of big crowds at big stadiums.

Gibson said: “I was fortunate enough earlier in my career to play in the Scottish Premier League and play against that sort of opposition most weeks.

“As my career went on it was cup ties and stuff like that which brought the bigger games.

“You just try and say to the young boys – don’t think too much about it, go out there and play your own game as you would do any other week.

“If my young players have got any aspirations of going on and furthering their career, then Friday night is a taste of what it can be like.

“I’ve played at Ibrox and Parkhead, it’s not really that different on the pitch. You can still hear one another.

“You zone out (to the atmosphere and singing), and hopefully the players can do that on Friday night and get on with the job that we’ve got to do.”

The manager added: “I said that at the time of the draw, the tie for the town, for the club and the fans – it was massive.

“To sell out our allocation and have to go back to Rangers for more, that just shows you how excited everybody is about the game.

“Can we get more of these fans on a regular basis? That’s what the long-term goal is.

“We’re playing some good stuff at the moment. We’ve had our dip at the start of the season with injuries and stuff and we had our troubles. We faced them head on and came through them.

“Hopefully we can kick on for the rest of the season.”

New and returning faces will be in the squad for the game.

Experienced goalkeeper Charlie Albinson has signed until the end of the season, while Tommy Goss has returned to Galabank.

Meanwhile, defender Cammy Clark has also signed back at Annan following time at Stirling and Dumbarton, however, he is cup tied for tonight.

Midfielder Josh Todd has gone the other way after penning a deal with the Sons following his release from Athletic by mutual agreement.

On the signing of Albinson, Gibson said: “To be fair, it was one of them where you feel like you’ve pulled a rabbit out a hat. “We were looking at possibly bringing Greg Fleming out of retirement as I’d moved Zach Balfour on. “I still think Greg is capable but he was kind of sitting on the fence whether he was going to do it or not.

“He had put the feelers out to see if there was any goalkeepers available and Charlie’s name came back.

“I thought we didn’t have much chance on that one. Some of the players I’m talking to now, you think – they’re not going to come to League Two or to Annan. But you don’t know unless you ask the question.”