Facts: Solid recent record at home to Scottish opposition

BVB, who were playing their sixth UEFA Champions League group stage campaign in succession, finished third in Group C behind Ajax and Sporting, although the Portuguese champions finished the group phase with nine points on the board as well. Rangers finished second in their Europa League group behind Lyon.

The Scots have won three of their eight meetings with BVB, who themselves have only triumphed once (in the most recent clash between the teams, the UEFA Cup third round in 1999/2000). BVB ran out 2-0 winners in front of their own fans to take the tie to a penalty shootout, which they won 3-1. Beforehand, there had been two draws in the Champions League group phase and two ties each with home and away legs in the UEFA Cup (1982) and Cup Winners’ Cup (1966) respectively; Rangers won on both occasions.

• BVB are unbeaten at home in seven European matches against Scottish opposition. There have been four wins and three draws. They have kept a clean sheet in six of those seven home matches, with the only goals conceded during that run scored by Rangers in a 2-2 draw in the 1995/96 UEFA Champions League group stages.
• The record in knockout ties with Scottish teams: through four times, eliminated twice.
• Since the UEFA Cup was rebranded as the Europa League, the Black & Yellows have twice reached the knockout stages: they beat Porto and Tottenham in 2015/16 before suffering an extremely unlucky defeat to Liverpool in the quarter-finals (1-1 H, 4-3 A), and were then eliminated in the 2017/18 last 16 when, after beating Atalanta, they were knocked out by Marco Rose’s Salzburg (2-1 H, 0-0 A).

• The club have a relatively even record in their 47 meetings with German teams: there have been 16 victories, 14 draws and 17 defeats.
• That said, the Scots have won only three of their 23 matches in Germany and have lost on seven of their last eight visits to the country. The last win in Germany for Rangers came in 1998/99, when they beat Bayer Leverkusen 2-1 in the second round of the UEFA Cup.
• The club ended the 2020/21 Scottish Premiership as champions and unbeaten; overall, it was their 55th domestic league title.
• Rangers returned to the UEFA Champions League for the first time in a decade this season, but suffered two 2-1 defeats to Malmö in the third qualifying round and didn’t reach the group stages. They then beat Alashkert 1-0 and 0-0 in the Europa League play-offs and qualified for the group stages of the competition for the fourth time in succession.
• It is Rangers’ fourth appearance in the knockout stages of the UEFA Europa League and the third in succession. On all three previous appearances, they went through their round of 32 tie before being eliminated in the round of 16; two years ago, it was Leverkusen that knocked them out (3-1 H, 1-0 A).