WEDNESDAY, March 16, 1988. The scene: Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow. The occasion: the second leg of the quarter-final of the European Cup. Graeme Souness’s Rangers team had travelled to Bucharest for the first leg but had lost 2-0 to the Romanian champions, Steaua Bucharest. Now, back on home turf, willed on by their full-throated fans, they set out to overturn the deficit. But while in the first leg the Romanians had taken just two minutes to score their opening goal, at Ibrox, they took just three. So now they were 3-0 ahead on aggregate, and Rangers need to score four.

That early goal was, wrote the Glasgow Herald’s Jim Reynolds, the thing the Scots had dreaded most. “They knew that if Steaua were to score at Ibrox their task would be doubly difficult, and all their carefully laid plans were blown to pieces. But how Rangers fought, and roared on by 44,000 fans they refused to give the Romanians an easy passage into the last four.” Richard Gough, then Ally McCoist from the penalty spot, gave Rangers hope before the interval, but there were to be no further goals; and Rangers lost 3-2 on aggregate.

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The home side that night was Woods, Nisbet, Munro, Roberts, Wilkins, Gough, D. Ferguson, Souness, McCoist, Durrant and Cooper. The photograph shows Graham Roberts and Steaua’s defensive wall at a free-kick.

Souness paid tribute to his players and said: “Our aim is to bring a European trophy to Ibrox, and the European Cup is the big one.”

There was no shame in losing to Steaua; they had after all won the European Cup in 1986, beating Barcelona on penalties, and they reached the final in 1989, when they lost to AC Milan.