A WEEK may be a long time in politics, but it can also seem like an eternity where football is concerned. Rangers fans should be glad of the fact. Back in the summer of 2005, it took the passage of just seven days for Celtic to morph from the shambolic outfit beaten 5-0 by Artmedia Bratislava to a side capable of recording a 4-0 victory against the same opponents, and this time it is their Glasgow rivals who must hope a week of extra practice and match sharpness sees them achieve a similarly rapid transformation. The carousel at Kaunas airport would be as good a place as any for the Ibrox club to lose the mental and physical baggage of their marathon 2007/08 campaign that they appeared to be laden down with during their goalless draw in their Champions League qualifier last Wednesday night.

Last season's run to the Uefa Cup final was great while it lasted, but essentially all Rangers have to show for it at the moment are a job lot of runners-up medals, a catalogue of injuries and some decidedly tired legs. Already, Barry Ferguson and Carlos Cuellar, two of the most overworked in last season's 67-game campaign, have succumbed to injury and - although Cuellar has a slight chance of returning for Tuesday's second leg - there was certainly little effervescence in the passing on show last Wednesday night. It is perhaps no surprise that Kenny Miller - a man uncontaminated by last season's trauma - was arguably the Ibrox side's best player.

And, according to Lee McCulloch at least, those medals are decidedly overrated. "I've not looked at the medal since," McCulloch said. "I only looked at it when I got it. I don't even know where it is, I think my mum has got it. Probably at the end of my career I'll look at it. I just think that the big one this year is the league and I wouldn't mind a league medal."

McCulloch is not exactly the kind to make any excuses about anything, but even he admits that last season saw his energy reserves plumb new depths. "It's the most tired I've been after a season," McCulloch said. "Big games, Champions League, Uefa Cup and things like four games in a week in the last week of the season was pretty demanding but we've spoken about it in the dressing room that it's all last season. It's in the past and it's a fresh start again for everybody."

Unlike Celtic, Rangers have not had the luxury of easing their way into their campaign. "We've had to hit the ground running with the qualifiers," he added. "You don't get much time, you need to produce right from the start. Kaunas are 15 games into their season, they're sharp and have match fitness and it's about going over there and doing a job. I think another week might help. We know the way they play now, their strengths and weaknesses. But it's going to be tough, I don't know if the pitch or stadium is any good but we've got to brush these things to one side and get the job done."

Yesterday's meeting with a Liverpool side also in Champions League preparation mode should help, but few at Ibrox are looking forward to a potential third round meeting with Bruce Rioch's Aalborg side just yet. A more positive use of last season's Uefa Cup experience is the knowledge that on numerous occasions during that campaign they made the away goals dynamic work for them after equally insipid first leg performances, or the fact that the match that started it all off, a patchy 2-0 win against Montenegrin side FK Zeta, was equally unpleasing on the eye.

"It was our first game and we must respect this," said Sasa Papac. "For us the season is only starting now and maybe in one week's time we will play better. I think it's like the beginning of last season against Zeta. Once again, that wasn't a good game, but we won 2-0. We were lucky against Zeta but after that we played better and better, and I hope that will be the same this year and we get better and better."

For Papac, Kaunas and Zeta are "maybe the same level". "They Kaunas are nothing special, with only maybe two good players Rafael Ledesma and Mindaugas Grigalevicius. They will be more confident in Kaunas next week and I think we will have more space to play in. They will attack us more and we have the players to make a couple of chances and win the game. We weren't nervous after 120 minutes against Fiorentina, so we won't be nervous in Kaunas."

The current feel-bad factor around the Ibrox club has been exacerbated by the fact that the injury to Ferguson, and the Steven Davis saga, has left the team badly deficient of the guile required to carve teams like Kaunas open at home, a position that fans had pinpointed as a problem area a long time ago. It is little wonder that, fresh from the £2.5m deal for Charlton Athletic defender Madjid Bougherra, such a solution is the club's next priority in the transfer market. The only problem is, unlike 1995 when a world class creative midfielder such as Paul Gascoigne could be secured for £4.3m, these players cost big bucks.

"How much would he Gascoigne be in the transfer market at this present moment?," Smith mused. "That is what I am talking about. If you are looking for a player who can do things like that, it is a lot of money these days.

"Last year, there was a level of criticism about us playing defensively, in Europe we have got to accept that, because that is how we set out our stall against what I thought were better teams, but domestically right up until the last games of the season we had scored more goals than anyone else in the league. In 99% of the domestic games we played with two and maybe three strikers.

"You need to add things bit by bit but unfortunately the bits we need to add at the moment are the bits of the team that cost you in the transfer market a lot of money," he added. "We don't have the levels of money to go out and match the English clubs in terms of explosive goal-scoring, goal-creating midfield players. We just need to look closely and make sure that when we do take a player for that area of the pitch he is going to improve on the level of player we have there at the moment." A bit of extra cash from a place in the Champions League group stages would certainly help. But they have to get there first.