DMAA

I think our chances are pretty slim. Every good performance will push his price up. QPR are struggling majorly so would likely give him a chance when he returns.

Only getting relegated would increase our chances I think, because then their already bad finances would be so desperate they'd likely be open to good offers.

As for Goss himself, he must be loving life at Rangers but for an English kid like him he'd never trade starting games in the Championship for Rangers. Playing in the Championship is a very big step closer to playing in the Premier League and that will be his ultimate goal. Would he trade being a backup in the Championship for starting for us? Surely! So here's hoping Holloway makes a poor decision and because of their poor finances they'll take a decent offer.

3 hours ago, buster. said:

That's an extreme long shot.

 

Mexican pundits expressed the thought that going to Rangers under Caixinha might spark his career aftera prolonged lull, no.

Some may have thought returning to Mexico with Cruz Azul might get him going, no.

 

He seems to have retired from professional football without actually telling anyone. 

 

#Payoff

 

 

 

 

I wonder now if Mark Allen (or someone on the board) took a gamble and refused a discounted transfer fee in January (say £1m) and instead gambled on a loan with the option of making it permanent at the higher price so that we could save face and say we got our money back (as the papers reported).

If so, that gamble hasn't paid off as there's no way they'll be paying £2m for him after seeing what he's like. Especially because Caixinha probably won't be there to buy him.

A chunk of Mark Allen's work in the summer will be finding somewhere for him to go to offload his wages. Recuperating the transfer fee we paid or even half of it isn't going to happen, which is a big blow to our finances.

On ‎20‎/‎02‎/‎2018 at 14:15, DMAA said:

The best centre backs Rangers have had have been tall and strong

Interesting wee article from the Scotsman today on the best defenders in the air. Good to see Alves topping it, but I was disappointed to see Bates at 9th despite being 6 foot 4 and this being considered one of his strengths.

Celtic's two main centre backs in top 5. They've still got the edge at corners in my opinion and it's something we need to look at for future defensive recruitments.

https://www.scotsman.com/image-gallery/in-pictures-most-aerially-dominant-centre-backs-1-4696723/4696724/img14696722

22 hours ago, Rousseau said:

They could, but they're not the same type of player; they would naturally drift up top, leaving us exposed in the middle.

 

Also, Cummings doesn't do the running the other two do. Morelos can run, but doesn't have the control or vision. 

 

Docherty -- and to lesser extent Murphy -- are the only ones I can see as being direct replacements for Windass; and both were on the pitch or had already been subbed (?).

 

This is just my opinion, of course...  

I'd like to see Cummings tested there against a bottom 6 side. His long shots would add a new threat from outside the box.

However Dorrans seems an ideal player to have there when he's back? I guess Dorrans and Docherty could be interchangeable betweem centre mid and attacking centre mid. Dorrans at home and Docherty away maybe when his legs are more useful on the break.

On a different topic, I'm surprised at the number of strikers Murty has on his bench. Miller, Cummings and Herrera. We only have 6 outfield subs, that's half the bench covering one position in our formantion. The other three were Alves, Halliday and Holt. 3 more central players.

For me MOH would offer a different option off the bench. Pace for the closing stages of a game away from home when you're maybe playing on the counter. And even Kranjcar can feel a bit hard done by (though I'm not a big fan). He would also cover a different position and is a different type of player. And I think we should have a policy of having at least one youth player on our bench if possible. Murty is stuck with Herrera and Miller and that's not his fault, but they just seem to get on the bench automatically even though they are not very good options to have imo.

On ‎24‎/‎02‎/‎2018 at 20:24, Frankie said:

All about the threat we now carry across the whole pitch  not just on our right side.

 

We're much less predictable.

Exactly. If your threat is coming from one side then they will sometimes have off days, or just come up against what is also the opposing team’s strong side.

When you have a threat on both sides you can more easily exploit the opposition’s weaker side. As well as just being far less predictable and more dynamic. 

Another wee stat, we had 24 shots today, more than any other home game this season (even the 6-0 vs Dunfermline). 

That tells its its own story. To get 24 shots against a side who had conceded 7 less than us before today shows we’re a much improved team with the new signings. Celtic managed 17 shots against them at Parkhead 3 weeks ago. 

We still have a lot to prove but we do seem to be the most creative team in the league at the moment. 

3 satisfying stats after today’s win;

1. We are now the league’s top scorers
2. We now have 2 x Aberdeen’s goal difference
3. We now have 3 x Hibs’ goal difference

Chances are either 1 or 2 won’t be true after tomorrow, but still some decent stats 

Tomorrow's match for me will settle the question of whether we will see a title race (of sorts) this season.

The optimist's hope is that post January transfer window we are much improved and can push an injury plagued and off-the-boil Celtic all the way. The pessimists insist we have no real reason to think that we are that different to before the window.

We've played 5 league games since coming back against both ends of the table. We've played against 3rd and 4th and 10th, 11th and 12th. 

Wins against the bottom 3 should be par for the course (especially by a margin of only 1 and 2).

1 win and 1 loss against 3rd and 4th at home is the reason we're not sure where we are and why the realists probably lean towards the pessimist's view.

A good win tomorrow will arguably prove the optimistic right. A scraped win will probably leave us still undecided but anything less than 3 points pretty much proves the pessimists right.

Hope to see another good attacking performance with good service for Alfredo.

He’s apologised and retracted those statements though. The damage is done yes but for me that still counts for something. Team mates from down south have said how he was still a big Rangers fan and talks about the club a lot etc. 

Just now, pete said:

I wonder what he will do if he scores. I think the crowd will boo him then.

Well this is the thing, I don't think there's a chance either of them would celebrate if they scored (I was going to say we'll see but hopefully we'll never know ). Both were pretty much using the papers to ask Rangers to come and get them when they were leaving Norwich.

I know the 2012 comments make this a little different, but I think these guys will be very proud of their contributions to Rangers and I think the least they deserve is indifference from the crowd.

There have been a few articles in the papers about how Lafferty and Naismith will deal with being booed at Ibrox.

Are people actually planning on booing them? I know they left the club at a bad time, but they were part of a very successful period for the club.

If Naismith hadn't apologised sincerely it would be more understandable to boo.  And Lafferty clearly has a lot of affection for the club too and was as desperate as Naismith to return.

We barely boo players we really don't like at Celtic. It seems to me bizarre to boo this pair.

1 hour ago, Yorkie Bear said:

The problem with the split is that Scottish football is so unbalanced. Everyone want to play Rangers and Celtic at home for the increased gate money so the SPFL have to second guess who will be in the top 6 so that those in the bottom 6 have had 3 old firm home games.  Some may be aggrieved that 2 out of their 3 were with Celtic and not the mighty but that’s tough.

 

The 4 teams outside the old firm in the top 6 should then get their 2 home games against both Rangers and Celtic. The fixtures between the four of them should sort themselves out with hopefully 2 home games but if that’s not possible for everyone, I can’t see it really matters as it’s all about gate receipts and whether Kilmarnock have 1, 2 or 3 games against Hibs doesn’t really matter.

 

If as a result of this set up we or Celtic have to play 5 away games then so be it. We will have played an equal number of home and away against the other top 6 clubs. If home advantage was all that it’s taken to be, we would have had an advantage in the earlier part of the season which would be reflected in our table position, but life is not that simple.

We have won 6/13 at home and 10/14 away.

Celtic have won 9/14 at home and 9/13 away

Aberdeen have won 8/13 at home and 8/14 away

Hibs have won  6/13 at home and 7/14 away

Hearts have won 5/13 at home and 4/14 away

Kilmarnock have won 5/13 at home and 4/12 away

 

So let’s not get hung up on playing at home in the final fixtures. Take the view that whatever they may throw at us, we will prevail.

It's crazy how little home advantage there seems to be across the top 6! Hearts have a minimal advantage and Killie (depending on their next away result), Hibs and Rangers a disadvantage and Aberdeen and and Celtic indifferent. Bizarre.

4 hours ago, Frankie said:

Worth reading Chris' thread if you haven't seen it already on this:

 

 

His last updated tweet, is he correcting himself to saying that we played away 8 times out of 12??

And Celtic only once in 12 seasons?

13 minutes ago, Rousseau said:

It's all relative. To go back to the main point, he was still a young player with potential. Are you trying to say he had no potential? He had potential, therefore Caixinha was looking to unearth young gems. Hindsight's a wonderful thing. I would still say he has potential, although I doubt it'll be fulfilled here. 

 

Papac is an example of a player looking less physically imposing doing a good job for Rangers. 

 

Your claim that to be a successful CB you need to be a physical brute is quite subjective. And I certainly don't think a Centre-back has a more physically demanding job than a FB. 

The disagreement is just over whether he fits into that first category of signing I outlined earlier, a young player who will develop with us and likely be sold on for a good profit. For me it's a no. He was already 23 and cost a hefty £1.3m without good reason to believe he was even worth that price with such poor defensive stats.

With regards to the comment about which position is more physically demanding, I didn't actually mean it like that I just meant stature and strength. The best centre backs Rangers have had have been tall and strong, Weir and Cuellar the best recent examples. Same for Celtic, Van Dijk most recently and Balde, Varga and Valgaeren going further back. All very big stong guys who could effortlessly defend set pieces all day. The best fullbacks can compete in the air but they don't need to be big strong bullies who win all their aerial battles.

58 minutes ago, Rousseau said:

Semantics. They were Caixinha signings; he had the final say. 

 

There were question marks around Cardoso, but most saw him as a good prospect; young, technical with a potential sell-on value. I think players come to this league all the time, lacking that physical presence and then develop it here to become better players. Wanyama is the perfect example -- and even Van Dijk to a lesser degree. Wanyama barely played initially because he could not deal with the physical nature of the league, but once he did, he became a superb defensive midfielder. 

 

It's a bit of a generalisation to state CB's "aren't successful at Rangers with those characteristics". Papac was pretty weak and poor physically when he arrived but developed into a superb LB. 

 

There may be more demanded of a CB initially, but I think the same applies: they become better as they become more muscular, more physical. That applies to Cardoso. Just because he's not physical now doesn't mean he can't in the future. I will concede he's not developing quickly enough, though. I think he has become stronger, but certainly not enough. On balance, I don't think he'll be good enough. Just because he's not developed, doesn't mean he didn't have the potential.

 

It doesn't matter. I agree with the two-pronged approach -- although I would like to see it supplemented with quality players now, regardless of nationality. I only disagreed with your claim that Caixinha didn't use the tactic; he did, although he didn't use it enough.   

It’s true that many have become better at the physical side of the game here, but Cardoso doesn’t have anything like the physical potential of Wanyama and Van Dijk. Both were already big physical guys. In fact with Wanyama I initially thought it was the technical side of his game that needed work. Van Dijk is 6 foot 4 and would almost certainly have already had an impressive aerial duel record before being signed. Cardoso’s record was appalling. 

Papac was most most successful at left back, alongside the tough tackling 6 foot 3 pairing of Weir and Cuellar. He wouldn’t have excelled at centre back because the physical demands are far greater. 

Yeh for me it's just about making sure there is something resembling a title race. Celtic will drop more points this season. They're dropping them all the time. That loss to Hibs has probably scuppered our chances of really challenging, but it we got close and put some space between ourselves and Aberdeen then we'd have a springboard for next season.

1 hour ago, Rousseau said:

I could get behind that statement. Your previous statement was just plain wrong.  

 

Of course he has to get credit for the above signings; they were signed when he was manager. Now you're just massaging the facts. 

 

At the time it looked like Cardoso was a good signing; young prospect, for not too much outlay. I don't think he'll be on that much, but he's certainly not at the quality we need. We were paying for potential there, though; which was one of your points. 

 

We did need experienced players too that could play to a good standard now. Candeias and Alves have fit that bill. 

Yes it was wrong, I had in mind his personal signings from his network. I was more thinking of what he brought to the table in terms of signings. The likes of Jack and Dorrans would have been suggested to whoever was the manager at the time imo, and Morelos was a Johanssen find. But I was wrong to say he as manager didn't employ either tactic because he agreed to spending good money on Morelos and Dorrans.

From the outside, it seems as though Caixinha's personal signings were Pena, Herrera, Cardoso, Alves, Candeias and Dalcio.

The "gem unearthing" tactic is obviously very hard, but Cardoso was never going to be one whereas Morelos ticked all the boxes. Morelos was 2 years younger, and very much proven at a lower level.

I remember reading a wee scout report of Cardoso when he signed which said,

"He’s not particularly robust in the tackle or in the air. He won only 53.18 per cent of his aerial duels in Portugal’s top flight last season (61st among all defenders who spent time at centre-back)". Another british Portugeuse football pundit said he was "surprised" and said something like he had never really stood out.

Centre backs aren't successful at Rangers with those characteristics. It just doesn't happen. In fact with those characteristics your career as a centre back in general can only go so far. Nobody had any excuse for thinking they were unearthing a gem with Cardoso. £1.3m seems to be an inflated transfer fee and I think we'd be lucky to ever get it back.

4 hours ago, Rousseau said:

Caixinha didn't use either? What about Morelos, Cardoso, Jack, Dorrans? 

 

We also need quality players that can play now, which is what Caixinha did with Alves and Candeias.

I’ll revise that with he didn’t use either enough, and I wouldn’t give him credit for Morelos, Jack and Dorrans. And Cardoso is an example I could have added to Pena and Herrera. Inflated transfer fee and probably wages. 

I think there are two primary tactics Rangers can use in the transfer market to get back to competing with Celtic.

The first is scouting out young players who we can develop and sell on for a major profit (Morelos type signings, and what Celtic have done for years). The best thing about this is it can transform the financial picture in a short space of time.

The second tactic is taking advantage of the club's standing with many players, primarily players who support Rangers (Murphy, Docherty, James MacArthur, Scott Arfield etc) but also Scottish players who are particularly attracted to the prospect of being Rangers players (Cummings, Lee Wallace, Russell Martin etc). The primary benefit of this tactic is it allows you to sign a higher calibre of player than would otherwise be possible, and normaly on discounted wages.

Davis fits into the second category, and I think Mark Allen has been very clever to use this tactic so far with signings of much higher quality than Rangers would otherwise have been possible, and as long as it doesn't mean the first tactic is neglected (because making money fast is vital just now) I'd be happy with a signing like Davis.

Caixhinha abandoned common sense and didn't use either tactic, signing average players who knew nothing about Rangers on very inflated wages and for inflated fees, Herrera and Pena in particular.

A bit of a side-note, but Celtic's woes are real. They've now failed to score in a league game on 4 occasions in only 2 months. We've only failed to score once in that period, in large part due to pot luck from Craig Gordon being hit by Morelos's header without knowing anything about it.

Musonda clearly isn't the world beater they thought he was and they put all their eggs in that basket in January. We have every chance of closing the gap (especially before Griffiths and Roberts return) if we show on Saturday we can still beat decent teams at home and Hibs was a blip.

If (and it's a big one) they progress in Europe that will hinder them further domestically.

1 hour ago, Gaffer said:

Centreback is definitely the area we need to sort out in the summer.  We need at least one signing for the first eleven.  Only Alves and McCrorie look solid enough to me.  Martin might grow into it and he deserves a little time to fit in with our team.

Forgot about Alves tbh (which speaks for itself), but he has the potential to add the quality required to give us a strong end to the season. With a stronger team around him and paired with McCrorie he might show his quality.

Only going on the highlights, but really pleasing to see so much creativity in the side. Murphy adds a real class that has been missing going forward. Docherty appears to compliment Goss well in the midfield, doing very different jobs for the team.

We need to start doing this at home and we can finally start to capitalise on a poor Celtic side getting off with murder this season. Traditionally a european run is very bad for domestic form and so it has proved. A series of injuries leaves us with absolutely no excuse not to run them very close. Morelos needs to stay till the end of the season for us to have a chance at doing that.

Centre back looks very much like a position under invested in though. Until we have real quality there we'll struggle. I hope McCrorie can improve it when he's back. I don't think it makes sense to put him into a centre midfield position which he wouldn't improve as much anymore.

With so much focus on his age it's easy to forget this is someone who's played 21 games this season in the best league in the world (and 2 in the cup), 90 minutes in most of those, let's not exaggerate. If he's managing that at 33 it's reasonable to assume he can perform at a high level in Scotland for another couple of years.

My concern is his position. We are pretty overloaded in there already really. Docherty, Jack and Dorrans all expect to be playing every game, not to mention McCrorie who many think should stay in midfield. James MacArthur is surely an optimistic target on a bosman for the summer too.

As I've said I'd prefer to treat signings as investments, but imagine getting Davis for a nominal fee and McArthur and Arfield on bosmans in the summer, with Kranjcar, Miller, Halliday and Pena leaving.

I think the way forward, generally, is to treat the transfer market like the stock market. Every signing needs to be an investment that will make the club money. This is the main way Celtic have opened such an enormous financial gap over us in the past few years. They've raked in about £50m in just 4-5 years.

We've got no chance of competing with them unless we can generate closer to the revenue they generate, and investing wisely is the shortcut to that.

However you obviously can't do that with every signing and if it's true money is no object for Davis then I'd welcome him coming in (in the condition Kranjcar goes and probably Halliday too). However, I was hoping we'd push for a bosman for James MacArthur. Not sure there would be space for both of them.

The consistency Walter Smith got out of his team was nothing short of miraculous. And even with the most exhausting fixture list in history he only just missed out on the title. Don’t think we’ll ever have a manager like him again.