A New Journey Begins

 

Last season we got to experience a wonderful journey that started at the Oresund Bridge and ended at the sarcophagus of Christopher Columbus. It was a journey that I thoroughly enjoyed but ultimately ended in failure. I'm certainly not trying to downplay our run in the Europa League, or our Scottish Cup win, however any season we don't win the league should be considered a failure (unless we win a European trophy to balance it out).

I started the season, like many others, with high expectations. That took a huge hit when we were put out of the League Cup Semi Finals by Hibs, in a very one-sided affair, and then seemed all but done after we were dismantled at Parkhead.

At that point plenty of folk were calling for Gio to go... little did they, or any of us realise what was about to come. He seemed to reinvigorate the team after this, and the displays in Europe were fantastic. None more so than the way we handled tournament favourites Borussia Dortmund.

That run did more than enough to earn him back the full backing of the support, and rightfully so, and even though it ended in agony in Seville, the blueprint was there for all to see. What we really needed to see though, was him doing it with his own team.

This summer's transfer business has meant we should see just that.

Goings

The instigator in any transfer business was always going to be sales. We're not foolish enough to think we aren't working with a limited budget, so if we wanted to see arrivals (and we certainly did) we needed to see some exits. 

First to leave was Cedric Itten. Unfortunately, it didn't work out at the club for the big Swiss striker, he had some fond moments, especially against Motherwell, but ultimately it just wasn't to be. He never seemed to fit our style, when he did play he looked lost a lot of the time, and bizarrely we seemed to have games where we'd be pumping the ball into the box for 5ft 6in Jermain Defoe, then we'd bring on 6ft 2in Ced the Ted and stop playing in crosses... work that one out.

Next to leave was Joe Aribo. This one was a little sorer for the Rangers fanbase. Joe came up here from Charlton, despite his then-manager Lee Bowyer's advice (no offence Bowyer but I'd do the opposite of your advice too tbh), and had a brilliant time at the club. Major contributions to both the League win in 2020/21 and Scottish Cup in 2021/22 as well as scoring the opening goal in the 2021/22 Europa League Final. I think the reason this one hurt so much is that most of us believe he could have, and will, go to a bigger club than Southampton, but not only that, we should have been able to command a much larger fee than we received. Unfortunately, these types of clauses are the ones a club playing in our league can expect players to insist on when signing extensions. Whatever way you look at it though, from paying a nominal fee to get the player, the contribution he made and the near £10m fee (if you include add-ons) is a phenomenal return. 

If Aribo is sore, then Bassey is excruciating. What a talent this boy is. We were just starting to see how good he was towards the end of last season when we were able to shift him back to his preferred left-back position. He put in Man of the Match performances in both the Europa League and Scottish Cup finals, and absolutely nobody will begrudge him his big money move to Ajax. Another huge profit was made with this transfer, nearly 100 times what we paid for him, and really allowed us to go looking for the next big potential signing.

I personally wish all 3 the best at their new clubs, and hopefully, we can see Bassey again in the Champions League.

Comings

As I said a lot of the moves we would make would rely on transfers out. We made our first signing back in January when Souttar signed a pre-contract, but then it seemed like we were never going to make a move. Rangers twitter was bombarding the official club Twitter account with messages calling for signings every time a tweet went up.

The first real summer signing was of course Antonio Colak, a player we knew from the start of the previous season when he had turned another departing Rangers favourite, Leon Balogun, inside out not once but twice to put us out of the Champions League qualifiers. A player who on paper has a decent return, but when looking at it in more detail hasn't really faced a test like he does now with us. I'll be honest at first I was happy with the signing, then I was a bit meh after the first couple of games, but having seen him in the flesh against Spurs I appreciate a lot more what he brings to the team than I did watching him on TV. I hope he can hit the ground running this Saturday, especially with our other 2 strikers missing.

The biggest pop of the summer signings for me though goes to Rabbi Matondo and Tom Lawrence. I make no secret of the fact I'm desperate for a Welsh hero at Rangers, and I don't want to get ahead of myself but after they came on against West Ham and combined for 2 goals and 3 assists, I feel safe saying they will be the greatest players Rangers have ever seen... OK, I'm exaggerating but I do have big hopes for them.

Malik Tillman and Ridvan Yilmaz both sound very exciting, both highly rated around Europe and I'm looking forward to seeing them play, but I'm going to withhold judgement for now because I have never actually seen them play. It is however a sign of intent, especially including the option to buy with Tillman.

The only one that offers me a slight bit of skepticism is Ben Davies, which will probably come as a surprise given the fee, but having never seen him play and the fact that he never made an appearance for Liverpool even when they had a defensive crisis I'm a little unsure. I'll give some credit to the scouting team though, as well as the football operations team, because it's a large layout so they must be sure.

Predictions

I'm going to go out on a limb and say I expect us to win the League, win at least 1 cup and make the group stages of the Champions League, and hopefully also later stages of either the Champions League or Europa League.

Anything less than a league and cup double/European run will be viewed as a failure, at least from myself. That's not to say I won't be celebrating anything and everything we win.

I also predict Lundstram to be player of the season, following his rise to glory at the end of last season, and for Rabbi Matonodo to be young player of the year.

I'd also like to see some extensions to Alfie and Kent, I would hate to see two huge players like them leave for free. Even more-so than I would have felt with Goldson leaving, who btw I'm delighted we've kept.

Now, enough talk, it's on to Livingston at the weekend to see how we are going to look for the season ahead. I'm hoping, and assuming, we'll come flying out the traps and really put the pressure on the rest of the league. I'm going to guess a 3-0 win, if you think anything different I'd love to hear in the comments.

Podcasts

As always I will continue to post links to our podcasts on the 4th official network. We're nearing the end of our first season of "Whose Team is it Anyway" and we're looking forward to recording the second season, which will be an EPL flavour, and will include guests such as The Spurs Show, The Anfield Wrap and ArsenalVision Podcast.

We've also started back up with the main Rangers podcast, hosted by Chris Bett, and we've lined up some exciting guests over the course of the season, so keep your eyes peeled.

Until then, I hope your team wins.

The Rambling Ger

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On a slightly personal note, I got to take my 4yr old daughter up for the Spurs game, her first game, and she loved it. She was dancing on the chair when we scored and everything. Was heartwarming to see her enjoy being at Ibrox as much as me and her brother.