Barry Ferguson’s men welcome the Basque outfit to Govan for the first leg of the hotly anticipated quarter-final.

Four of his players, however, could face suspension from the return tie in Bilbao should they be booked.

Indeed, Europa League rules state that if a player receives three yellow cards throughout the competition before the semi-finals, they will receive a one-match ban.

Currently, Rangers quartet Jefte, Nicolas Raskin, Hamza Igamane and Connor Barron have accumulated two yellow cards each, so if any of them are booked on Thursday, they will miss the return leg with Athletic.

Ferguson already has Mohamed Diomande and John Souttar unavailable for Thursday’s tie-opener because of the number of bookings they each built up in the league phase and last-16.

All yellow cards will reset after the quarter-finals are concluded.

Should Rangers manage to beat Athletic in their last-eight clash, they will face either Manchester United or Lyon in the semi-finals.

Full focus is currently on the Spaniards after a defeat tp Hibernian on Saturday: “I know they’re a quality team,” Ferguson said of Athletic.

“But again, these are the games where you don’t need to really motivate people because you’re [in] Europe. It’s a different kind of atmosphere. That doesn’t concern me.”