BORUSSIA DORTMUND boss Marco Rose has pinpointed Rangers' stars Alfredo Morelos and Ryan Kent as the men they will need to keep quiet in this week's Europa League clash in Germany.
Dortmund reignited their Bundesliga title challenge by easing past Union Berlin at their atmospheric Stadion An der Alten Forsterei with a classy display.
Two first half goals from skipper Marco Reus were added to by Raphael Guerreiro to hand Dortmund the perfect boost before they welcome Rangers to their Westfelenstadion on Thursday as they cut the gap on leaders Bayern Munich to six points.
It was the ideal way to bounce back from last week's humiliating 5-2 home loss to Bayer Leverkusen and this was a real confidence booster with a thumping away win over a Union Berlin side who were sitting in fourth place.
And Rose was keen to turn his attentions to the Ibrox side and has clearly already done his homework.
He said: "Preparation for Rangers is already going on in the background. They play 4-2-3-1 and 4-3-3, they attack with speed down the left wing with Ryan Kent.
"And they have a little striker up front, Alfredo Morelos, who works hard, fights and knows where the goal is.
"In general, they are a force at home, Ibrox is known for the atmosphere. We're at home first and we know it will be an intense game, so we want to make our mark in the first leg.
"The Europa League is a new competition for us and a lot of our players have never played in it. "Rangers are a really good team who play good football.
"It's important that we enjoy this win and let out the frustration from last week. We've had a few slaps in the face recently so it was so important we kept a clean sheet today. We can build on that, but we still have a lot of work ahead of us."
Dortmund suffered a blow before the game when Giovanni Reyna - named after Rangers boss Giovanni van Bronckhorst because of his father Claudio's friendship with his former Rangers colleague - was taken ill and couldn't play having just returned from being out since August with a hamstring injury.
And of course, the Germans were still without prolific scorer Erling Haaland who is rated as 50/50 to be fit for the match on Thursday after being out with an abductor muscle injury. Also injured were Thorgan Hazard, Thomas Meunier and Marius Wolf.
Dortmund took a deserved 18th minute lead after good work from Portuguese left back Guerreiro set up captain Reus to drill the ball through keeper Andreas Luthe.
Dortmund were enjoying themselves and doubled their lead eight minutes later when a mix-up in the home defence allowed Reus to run through before rounding the keeper to cooly finish.
And it was game over with 19 minutes to go when Guerreiro somehow squeezed the ball in from an acute angle after BVB broke on the counter.
Even when Dortmund's defence was finally breached a couple of minutes later after Kevin Mohwald headed home from close range, it was ruled out after a VAR check for an elbow.
It was Dortmund's day and they looked a pretty effective unit.
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