Hope wee Temps gets back fit again soon and pushing for a place in the Team...... Greg DAVID TEMPLETON would be entitled to think the price of personal sacrifice that had to be paid for joining Rangers has been excessively steep. His last game for Hearts saw him score the goal that almost dumped Liverpool from the Europa League at Anfield. The following day he joined a club who, at that point, weren’t allowed to play in European competition for three years by order of UEFA. Templeton’s displays at Hearts had allowed him to hope he might be knocking on the door of international recognition. But yesterday the 24-year-old admitted he had “given up all hope of playing for Scotland” for as long as Rangers were missing from the domestic game’s top flight. Now the irony is injury has once again seen to it Templeton isn’t even able to get a game for Rangers. He hasn’t managed a pre-season match so far and won’t feature in tonight’s friendly away to Sheffield Wednesday. But Templeton was at Murray Park yesterday to help publicise the visit of Newcastle to Ibrox next Tuesday, a game he’s targeted for the start of his road back to fitness and form. And he revealed the doom and gloom of watching on as others took his spot was eased by the japes and support of fellow injury-victim Dean Shiels. He said: “You could say that I’ve been unfortunate with injury since I got here “I was badly injured in my very first game for Rangers and that was really unlucky. Then I missed out on the latter part of the season as well. “But I was left out of the pre-season games this time in case I made a hamstring injury even worse. From what I can gather, the rest of the lads have played well while winning all five friendlies and conceding no goals. “It’s hard to get back into a team when the lads are flying. You have to be mentally tough to come into a near deserted Murray Park every day when the squad’s abroad. “But at least I had my fellow injury victim Dean Shiels to keep me sane because he’s a very funny guy.” But putting a career on hold at European and international level is no laughing matter and Templeton already knew there was distance between him and the Scotland squad before he signed for Rangers. He said: “I played really well for Hearts and couldn’t get a look-in with the national squad. There was a run I went on leading up to a friendly game against the Faroes when I won two Young Player of the Month awards on a back-to-back basis but still didn’t get picked by Craig Levein. “Since then I haven’t let myself think about international football because I was so gutted about being left out that time. When I signed here I gave up all hope on the Scotland squad for the first few years. “If we do get back to the top level and I’m playing regularly maybe I’ll get a sniff. I did have a lot to wonder about when it came to sacrificing any chance of playing in Europe when my last match for Hearts was at Anfield. “But what an unbelievable achievement it would be if I could be part of the long-term project to take Rangers back to that level of the game.” The one novelty Templeton would rather avoid, if he could, would be a meeting of his present club and his former club in the First Division next season. David hopes for promotion for Rangers but doesn’t want to see the Tynecastle club demoted. He said: “They’ve been deducted 15 points for going into administration and so survival can’t be guaranteed but I hope they stay up because there’s good young talent at the club. I sensed the club was in trouble when I was there and the money they got for me kept them going for six months. Then they sold Ryan McGowan and that bought them more time but administration came about in the end and now the team have a tough job on their hands because they start off at such a disadvantage. “My personal priority has to be to overcome my own difficulties. I’m doing extra work with our new fitness coach, Jim Henry, but match fitness is different. The game against Newcastle is my target. “When I reflect on my first season with Rangers I’ll think I was unlucky with injury and now I’m missing the pre-season games for this campaign because I’m hurt again. “What I really need is a run in the side to build up some sort of consistency. There’s loads of competition for places and that’s got to keep everyone on their toes.”
Posted on: Wed, 24 Jul 2013 09:02:58 +0000
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