PEDRO CAIXINHA hopes he will have almost a full strength squad to choose from sooner rather than later as Rangers prepare for Friday’s clash with St Johnstone.

Captain Lee Wallace is now the only long-term absentee for the Light Blues as he continues to recover from a groin injury.

Danny Wilson and Niko Kranjcar have returned to training, while midfielder Jordan Rossiter is also on course to get back on the park.

But defensive duo Bruno Alves and Ross McCrorie won't return to Auchenhowie until later in the week after their international exploits with Portugal and the Scotland Under-21s respectively.

Caixinha said: “It’s going to be a short week as we play on Friday, so the players who will play on Tuesday like Bruno, and we hope he plays against Switzerland, will only have three days to recover.

“The same will happen with Ross who is playing in Latvia. This is the reality, and we need to organise things in that way.

"The boys who are here are doing a great job and the only thing we are thinking about at the moment is getting three more points on Friday.

“Maybe next week, Jordan can start training with the team. Niko and Danny started the previous week and will be with us again this week.

“I think David Bates too can join us on Thursday, so that means that the squad is getting completed again and we can have more options.

“All the boys who have been options in the last games have been doing great, doing what we want, and we are happy to have everyone on board so we have much more competitiveness which gives us more doubts in terms of the selection of the players. That is great for us.”

Rangers make the trip to McDiarmid Park six points off the pace in the Premiership after a mixed start to the campaign.

Caixinha’s side ended last season with a 2-1 win in Perth and the Portuguese is expecting another tough encounter this time around.

He told RangersTV: “It is going to be a huge challenge, and we have the idea from the last game of last season, and I think we need to do more of the same.

“When I say that, I mean we need to play more our way than letting the opponent play their way. They are very strong and if we let them play the game, the ball will be in the surroundings of our box all of the time, they will be winning second balls, they will be fighting, they will be close to the last-third and we will have problems with that.

“We have a strategy to take the ball and play our own game, otherwise we will have some difficulties.”