The Ibrox club will lend Blackburn their training facilities to practise set-pieces this morning before the second round

The Ibrox club will lend Blackburn their training facilities to practise set-pieces this morning before the second round, first leg match in the evening.Souness claimed it was “no big deal” and that, if Rovers had drawn Rangers, then he would have put a similar request to Celtic. “But this is Glasgow we are talking about, and I’ve worked there, so I should not be surprised.”However, given that Blackburn’s players will have to put up with a 50-mile round trip to reach Rangers’ training complex from their hotel, Souness’s explanation may do little to dilute Old Firm paranoia.Martin O’Neill shrewdly refused to be drawn into Souness’s mind games “It’s a free country. Graeme can do what he wants,” the Celtic manager said with a smile. Even when he heard that the former Rangers manager had doubted Henrik Larsson’s entitlement to a world-class rating after the Celtic striker’s performances for Sweden in Japan during the summer, O’Neill refused to bite.”That’s up to Graeme, but maybe he has not seen him as much as I have,” said the Northern Irishman, before extolling the pedigree of Blackburn’s Dwight Yorke and Andy Cole, and proclaiming Damien Duff to be “a potentially world-class player.”Duff, in contrast to his manager, is a fan of Larsson, who finds imitation the best form of flattery. “He’s Celtic mad,” said his team-mate Egil Ostenstad, when the Republic of Ireland winger revealed he owned a green-and white shirt with Larsson’s name and number.Despite the Battle of Britain tag, O’Neill will opt for sang-froid tonight rather than the Souey-baiting his side’s fans will indulge in “To me, it’s a Uefa Cup tie. I don’t see it as a British game, especially the cultured way that Blackburn play.”He cited his own experience with Nottingham Forest against Liverpool in the European Cup tie in 1978-79 as evidence. “The Liverpool players admitted later that they treated it like an English league game and when they went 1-0 at the City Ground, they went chasing an equaliser – only to lose a second goal in the dying minutes.”O’Neill believes his team generate more admiration than antipathy south of the border.

“I don’t think people in England look down their noses at Scottish football,” he said. “It’s just that they feel their own league is pretty strong and prefer to compare it to Italy or Spain, than Scotland.”I agree with what Graeme said at the weekend about Celtic and Rangers doing well if we joined the Premiership, but that is hypothetical. Celtic and Rangers have always been big clubs, but access to the kind of money the Premiership has would allow them to attract the very best players.”Some might argue that O’Neill already has them. Apart from Larsson and Chris Sutton, who could damage his old club, Stilian Petrov is currently showing why Bulgaria have made him captain at the age of 22. The midfielder will play for Celtic with a cast protecting a broken hand.European nights can be special at Parkhead, as Alan Thompson discovered when he netted the winner against Rosenborg in the Champions’ League a year ago. “People in England know about Celtic,” said the former Bolton man, “but I doubt if many Blackburn players will have played in the kind of atmosphere Parkhead has.”CELTIC (probable, 3-5-2): Douglas; Valgaeren, Bald?Laursen; Agathe, Lambert, Lennon, Petrov, Thompson; Larsson, Sutton..

Ireland’s Padraig Harrington has swapped a beach in Spain for the tourist sights of Rome in his bid to become the European No 1. Harrington had planned to be on holiday in Marbella this week, but that was before he won the Dunhill Links Championship, seven days after helping Europe regain the Ryder Cup at the Belfry. I was driving round the city with [the Italian player] Marcello Santi showing us all the sights, the Vatican was totally empty and we saw the Colisseum and the Trevi fountain.”The Order of Merit is very important, when you come to the end of the year everyone is focused on it, whether it’s to get their tour card, get into the top 60, or to try and win it.”The last six weeks is when it comes into focus and you’re jockeying for position. Earlier on in the season you are trying to do as well as you can and win as many tournaments but it’s certainly an aspiration of mine to win the Order of Merit.