Miller sustained a calf injury against St Mirren in November

Rangers manager Walter Smith expects Kenny Miller, Sasa Papac and Steven Davis to be available for the upcoming SPL trip to Hamilton.

Miller injured his calf last month in the 2-1 defeat at St Mirren, Papac has sat out recent games through injury and Davis missed out for family reasons.

"I think he'll be fit to play; it looks as though the calf injury will clear," Smith said of Miller.

"He (Papac) will be back at the weekend and Steven Davis will be back as well.

Smith added: "I just felt that going to Tynecastle, with Sasa being out for two games and the type of game it was going to be, it would have been a difficult one to come back into."

Striker Miller's absence has been especially felt as Rangers have suffered from a clinical goalscoring edge since his flourishing partnership with Kris Boyd was interrupted by the calf problem.

I think he (Kenny Miller) will be fit to play; it looks as though the calf injury will clear Rangers boss Walter Smith

"He will maybe be able to start training in the middle of this week," Smith continued.

"He had been playing well for us but we have to cover for the loss of players. We feel we have a big enough squad to do so, and we didn't do so.

"When that happens, we can only look at what happens during the games."

The Rangers boss is looking for a vast improvement on their previous SPL outing which ended in a 2-1 defeat at Hearts, leaving them seven points behind arch title rivals Celtic.

"It was a disappointment for us. We didn't start the game well at Tynecastle," Smith told the club's official website.

"It was very similar to the game we had there at the start of last season. That should have been warning enough for everybody who was here.

"But we didn't start well and gave away two goals from set plays and we ended up putting ourselves under pressure by giving away fouls easily.

"That allowed Hearts to get the ball into dangerous areas, not just at the goals, but on another four or five occasions afterwards as well.

"We gave away cheap fouls and, in the end, we paid for that.

"Even after an hour of the match when we controlled the game and Hearts were pinned back in their own half, we didn't really create a worthwhile opportunity in that period.

"It was a disappointing performance on a couple of levels."

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