David Healy pledges to make up for Nikica Jelavic loss

DAVID Healy woke up on Wednesday morning as Rangers’ No 1 striker. The circumstances of his elevation to a status he has dreamed of since childhood may not have been as he envisaged but the 32-year-old Northern Ireland international is determined to make the most it regardless.

Starting with tomorrow’s William Hill Scottish Cup fifth-round tie against Dundee United at Ibrox, the burden will fall on Healy to deliver a sizeable portion of the goals Rangers require to cope with the loss of top scorer Nikica Jelavic to Everton a few hours before the transfer window closed on Tuesday night.

“It’s a motivation for me, of course it is,” said Healy. “It was the motivation I had when I was coming to this club. I’ve never hidden the fact how much I have wanted to play for Rangers and I’d love to be a hero for this club like the manager was.

“If we win the league and Scottish Cup this year, it will be talked about for a long time to come. Wth the year that we have had, with Nikica leaving, money trouble, tax trouble, whatever else you want to talk about, it would be of huge significance in Rangers history.

“We were all hoping Nikica would have stayed but big players have left Rangers before and the club has always moved on to further success. We were written off at one stage last season, but we proved people wrong with our fighting spirit. We still have a lot of big characters in our dressing room, lads who have been over the course and distance, and we can do it again.”

With Kyle Lafferty and Kane Hemmings still at least a couple of weeks away from returning from injury, Rangers manager Ally McCoist will have to be resourceful in the business of finding a striking partner for Healy. Winger Sone Aluko played just off the Ulsterman in last week’s 4-0 win over Hibs and McCoist revealed he could also consider recent signing Mervan Celik for that role against United. “Mervan can play there,” said McCoist. “Not as an out and out striker but he can play in that area. Everybody is a possibility in the circumstances.”

United manager Peter Houston believes McCoist will use Rangers’ off-field troubles as a motivational tool for his players. “There’s no doubt that we face a really tough fixture,” he. “They have a good group there with big characters and they will be using that to bring them together.”