Rangers’ transfer window; the saga continues

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Of no doubt are the mild tensions among a portion of the Rangers support of present. While on the pitch the team is playing almost immaculately, and off the pitch accounts make for productive reading, the transfer window has become an issue of division and contention within the fanbase.

It started fantastically, with early signatures of Polish goalie Maciej Gostomski from Lech Poznan and English forward Harry Forrester from Doncaster Rovers secured, followed up promptly with a double swoop for Accrington Stanley pair Josh Windass and Matt Crooks on pre-contracts.

But of late the Toumani Diagouraga and Michael O’Halloran soap operas have dampened some spirits with the former ending up at Elland Road, while the latter appears no closer to completion and no apparent third bid being submitted.

This will concern manager Mark Warburton greatly – while he has rightly preached value for money and a stubborn refusal to bid more than Rangers’ strict valuation of a target, he equally hoped to have a new face in by Monday.

“I hope to have new signings in by Monday, if the work goes ahead and all parties are happy. In any negotiation all parties have to be happy, so if we can get to that point then great and I am very hopeful we will do. We are making good progress, these things sometimes happen very quickly and other times they demand more negotiation and to-ing and fro-ing but fingers crossed we get them over the line.”

Warburton expressed this view around four days ago, and there is little reason to believe he meant anything else other than what it says.

The fact we have now reached Monday and no new faces have appeared will bother him. Whatever the cause is, whether it is a refusal to pay the requested sum, or clubs refusing to sell, or players being swayed by alternative offers, Warbs will not be entirely thrilled that two of his big targets have not arrived, and nor indeed have any targets materialised by the date he set out.

It is not as colossal a problem as it appeared – this squad is barely seven months old and is still growing together, but with winger Nathan Oduwa’s departure still fresh and growing speculation linking young Ryan Hardie and Canadian winger Fraser Aird with loans away, Rangers are at slight risk of being a little too lean even for Warburton’s liking.

There is also the matter of the performances on the pitch – midfield and attack, recently, have been frankly excellent, and new signing Forrester has only made one brief cameo as a sub in the two match squads he has been called up to. This is what any new faces are up against. Consequently Rangers are not requiring urgent signings for reparation of poor form; quite the contrary.

But nevertheless the season has plenty of matches left, not least this evening’s trip to Cappielow, and injury and suspension will play key roles particularly in these winter months. As a result, new faces really are key to the continued running of this smoothly oiled machine, and fans’ frustration at the transfer sagas which have started to punctuate Rangers’ dealings in this window over the past weeks or so is understandable.

It is by far from the worst crisis Rangers have ever dealt with – but it is a mild irritation.

How it unfolds from here on in could well shape just how this league campaign plays out.

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33 COMMENTS

  1. Wi definitely need at least one decent signing a defensive cm is a requirement now…..would be like getting two players by freeing up Halliday an a poacher would be handy……

    • how about the fact rangers already agreed terms with ohalleran 2wks ago,,now jist going to leave him in limbo,,you have to ask yourself when rangers were agreeing wage terms with him they would surley have told him it will be done very soon,,obviously dont have finiances available,??

    • You need to get a team's permission to speak to their players. If as I have read previously discussions took place with the player, then Rangers would be chastised and fined for tapping. However the Scottish media can do a job of tapping for Rangers, like the Scott Allan carry on last year. Again Rangers come up short with the readies. Where is King's £30m, surely since he took over (never voted in mind you) interest alone on that £30m could have paid for O'Halloran? OR maybe King was just lying Glibly. You choose..!!

  2. O'Halloran would be an excellent signing! One of the fastest and most productive wingers in Scotland at present.

    I'd love to see Ali Crawford from Accies join our ranks and possibly Greg Kiltie from Killie.

  3. I've been on here since last week advising all that my understanding (through gers player contact) is that the club had given up on both Diagouraga and O'Halloran early last week due to the fees being demanded by both Brentford and St Johnstone. I advised last week that Brentford were looking for 1M+ for Diagouraga (which is exactly what they got from Leeds with 600k plus add ons) and St Johnstone want 500k minimum which we are not prepared to pay. Attention was then turned to securing Windass and Crooks in January but that won't happen either apparently. Accrington Chairman has stated he is looking for 400k to release both players early but with pre-contracts signed and a fee of only 60k due in 15 weeks time, it would be bad business to pay 400k now for the sake of a 15 week wait. Rumours coming out of Auchenhowie is that our January transfer dealings are most probably done. Not good head lines but we must continue to work with in our budgets and cannot get dragged into bidding wars. If we cant afford a player, we move on. Simple

  4. You are right that in comparison to recent history this is only a mild irritation, but it would create huge momentum for the second half of the season if we get O'H in (be nice to get W&C in early from Acc. Stan. too).

  5. Really not worried if MW wanted to spend the 1+ million on a DmC he would have, it did nor represent value… He says this and I agree, whith the add ons Diagoura became quickly overpriced, Nothing to an English Championship club woth their available revenue. I believe thw choice here is MW's. O'Hallaron is not a player I value more than what has already been offered. If we spend half a mil on this guy I will be reaaly pissed off, just dont believe he has the desire to play for Rangers and will always be a Septic to me, reall hope we go elsewhere….

  6. No need to panic. We didn't get the big French DM but I see no need to overpay for O'Halloran, who doesn't want to come to Rangers anyways I'm guessing.

    Will Vaulks is an option.

    • Nathan there is no need to panic regarding players but there is a slight concern over the magic hat man, he has now told us twice signings were imminent & twice we have signed nobody so to my understanding he was calling the board out & twice they have let him down, now in the summer he brought in players that have done a great job so far, so he has done his job by improving these players, now let's say a bid came in for Jason holt do you think it would be the 65k we paid for him no it would be at least ten times that so time for board to step up & deliver what the magic hat wants

  7. It would be nice to get some talent in that can make a difference,personally I think it's down to money,one thing though,gers will have to bring in some talent in the summer if they go up

  8. At the end of the day not getting the two players is no big deal as we have chief scout who I am sure will be identifying new targets for summer when the real business is done. You only need to look at the quality MB brought in last summer to know that we should be patient.

  9. Real business done in the summer?

    That may well be the case but by then we will be in the SPFL and clubs will be asking for more money for transfer fees and the players will be looking for more money in wages.

    Still begs the question where is the money coming from?

  10. Fuck sake Ibrox Noise, you're posting this at 7.15am. Let them get out of their beds before the doom and gloom. Listen, you could very well be correct and we miss out on targets but let it run its course even if Monday comes and goes.

  11. Cast your mind back to when the wifi company tried to ring fence £300000 the rangers solicitor stated that if they had to pay the club did not have the money and it would have to come from another source that says it all

  12. Don't jump the gun with that SPFL talk , it's not a foregone conclusion ,there's still a lot of work to be done . Getting a couple of decent players in now would be a great boost , like i'm sure Hibs have been galvanized by their recent signings . So important we get a good result at Morton tonight for starters .

  13. Deviating away from transfers the government via HRMC have done a deal with google regards tax were we not told by HMRC when were involved with the so called big tax case etc that hmrc does not do deals so how come not for us but for others questions should be raised within parliament as to why

    • Because Google are NOT a British registered company, and therefore not subject to same tax liability.
      The "deal" to HMRC was "Take this or get Hee Haw".

  14. King's true colours are showing through. All mouth and no actions in terms of his own investment but very good at getting others to part with their cash.

    Warburton highlighted his two prime targets and £1m would most likely have secured them for Rangers yet we let a basket case of a club, Leeds United, take one of the players and with under a week to go until the window closes there is no real sign of any new arrivals.

    The two players that have arrived so far can hardly be heralded as big name signings and the two Bosmans won't arrive until the summer. Yet £400,000 would most likely have secured their services now for the run in.

    What exactly has happened to King's £30m and the front end loading of moneys, supporting the manager etc etc., it is all beginning to look like more Murray moonbeams!

    While Warburton has towed the Party line he cannot be happy at losing out on players he wanted and if, through King and Co's failure to support him in the transfer market he ends up heading South we will be in a significantly worse position with yet another Chairman that cannot be trusted.

  15. MW's wishes should be paramount. The league has still to be won. Imperative.If he wants one, two more players to achieve the goal let's get them in. Not to do so, lose momentum and fail on promotion would be a monumental failure that should not be taken any chance on. With a run in the cup and an outside chance of European games next year, both could bolster funds. Having said all that, there are still six days to go and I expect deals may even be done and announcements could be made at any moment. The manager and his team know better than me or any newspaper hack why deals will be done or otherwise.It is their judgement and so far it has been absolutely top rate. MW walks on water and long may he do it forever and at Rangers.

  16. HMRC attempted to do a deal with SDM who offered £10 M to settle the £72M EBT bill.

    HMRC said it wasn't enough.

    Try to keep up.

  17. Honestly…..you so called supporters (and i dont mean everyone on this blog) need a feckin reality check. You all read / listen to too much nonsense which gets spewed out by the press and Celtic trolls…. HALF of the 30M that King promosed has already been spent!! I'm a share holder (small) and i have copies of the annual accounts as do all share holders. King never once said he would personally invest £30M. What he said is that £30M would need invested in order to get the club back to competing with Septic. Well guess what all you 'supporters'…. £5M has been spent on legal fees. £5M paid to fat Ashley to get ownership of our properties back and another £5M has been spent on transfer fees, wages and cancelled player contracts AND that was only up to the end of last year. How much has been spent since Jan transfer window opened?? Well when you account for wages for the new keeper and Harry Forester plus whatever wage package we have agreed with the two lads from Accrington, i think you will find well over £20M has been spent since King took over…. Wake up and smell the coffee bears and stop falling for some of the pi*h you read on this site

  18. Rangers won't be signing any 1,rangers need money,they need fresh investment,I believe we r 2 injurys away from a crisis

  19. King doesn't have £20 thousand, never mind £20 million.

    If King had delivered north of £7 million personally as per level 5's Daily Radar eejit, SARS would have him locked up and thrown the key away.

    SARS questioned him when he bought his shares asking him where the money came from……….I borrowed it was the reply just as he has with any further contribution.

    Make no mistake if King had personally come up with cash SARS would have crucified him.

  20. To all the smelly trolls!
    I don't see Desmond dipping into
    his personal fortune despite you's
    demanding big name signings .
    Champions league ur having a laugh!

  21. If I remember right ! King also had said it could take us a few years to sort out the
    mess caused by the previous regimes.
    Were only 7 months in and the critics are
    out already. To the king snipers, the guy
    has lost a previous investment of 20 mill.
    Don't think he's gonna be so fuckin stupid
    second time round.The revenue streams in
    this country cannot justify pumping millions
    into toppling the Europa league no hopers?

  22. It may not be down to king directly!
    Warburton has said publicly that he will look for value for the benefit of the football club.
    Do not rise to the smelly mob.
    The same guy took Brentford within touching
    distance of the premiership ffs.If you look at the Allan situation, his said he was crucial
    to their promotion prospects then sell him to
    Smelltic for peanuts in my opinion given the market nowadays.So he obviously wasn't that highly regarded when they got shot of him as soon as the smelly's came for him
    They didn't hold them to ransom.
    That's what were up against in this country
    of haters.

  23. Anybody who's interested should
    have a look on google at Celtic transfers
    between 2006/2011 makes interesting
    reading in light of all their claims.

  24. That smelly mob HIV some brass neck.
    Stokes goes to hivs on loan with the
    SA transfer revenue.
    Needs investigated!

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