Europa League draw: Rangers given fighting chance with glamour trip to Seville the highlight - when fixtures will be released

Rangers have been given a fighting chance of progressing beyond the group stages of the Europa League after being drawn alongside Real Betis of Spain, Czech champions Sparta Prague and Cypriots Aris Limassol.

Rangers dropped into the Europa League following their Champions League defeat by PSV.

Michael Beale’s men were a pot one team in Friday afternoon’s draw and therefore avoided some of the heavyweight teams such as Liverpool, West Ham, Ajax and Atalanta, and they should have reason to be confident of their chances in Group C. While no pool is never straightforward, the 2022 finalists managed to avoid some of the more dangerous teams in pots two, three and four, with as Olympiacos, Sporting, Marseille, Brighton, AEK Athens and Panathinaikos placed elsewhere. They will also return to the city Seville, where they lost the 2022 Europa League final to Eintracht Frankfurt, although there match will not be at the venue of that match, the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan, instead being in action at the iconic Estadio Benito Villamarín when they face Betis.

Drawn from pot two, Real Betis finished sixth in La Liga and are managed by former Manchester City and West Ham boss Manuel Pellegrini. While they recently faced Celtic in the 2021/22 Europa League, they have never faced Rangers. They will provide stern opposition to the Ibrox outfit, with a strong Spanish core including Hector Bellerin, Marc Bartra, Borja Iglesias, Ayoze Perez and Isco augmented by the talented Portuguese playmaker William Carvalho, captain Andres Guardado of Mexico, Frenchman Nabil Fekir and Brazilian forwards Willian Jose and Luiz Enrique.

Rangers’ pot three team are Sparta Prague from the Czech Republic, Europa League regulars. Brian Priske’s men won the Czech title last season and were defeated in the Champions League qualifiers by FC Copenhagen on penalties. Their squad is largely made up of homegrown players and they play their home matches at the epet ARENA. The two teams first met in 1991/92 European Cup, with Sparta progressing on away goals following a 2-1 win at Ibrox. The duo were paired together in the group stages of the 2021/22 Europa League, with Sparta winning the home match 1-0 before Rangers won 2-0 at Ibrox. They booked their spot in this season’s group stages with a remarkable comeback against Dinamo Zagreb in the play-off round, overcoming a 3-1 first leg deficit. They are strong at home.

The pot four team was always going to look the weakest and Aris Limassol, the Cypriot champions, look reasonable opposition given the potential other options. Managed by Belarussian coach Aleksey Shpilevsky, their squad is multicultural, with a smattering of Brazilians and African players. They thumped Slovan Bratislava 7-4 in the play-off round and score plenty of goals, particularly at home, the Alphamega Stadium. This will be only their second appearance in a European competition.

Three other British teams were part of the Europa League draw. West Ham will face Olympicacos, Freiburg and TSC in Group A, Brighton will face Ajax, Marseille and AEK Athens in Group B and Liverpool will face LASK, Union Saint-Gilloise and Toulouse in Europa League Group E. UEFA say the fixtures will be released by Saturday at the latest.