Will 20-cap international be a success at Ibrox?

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Will 20-cap international be a success at Ibrox?
 Article by: Richard, for Ibrox Noise

Carlos Peña, 27-year-old, 5’ 10” attacking midfield star who has been capped 19 times by Mexico and was selected to play for them in the 2014 World Cup Finals whilst playing for Leon and is now with Rangers and hoping to force his way into playing for us very soon.

The Scottish giants agreed a fee with Chivas Guadalajara for the midfielder’s services and according to Mexican outlet Laaficion, the Liga MX outfit got $4.5m (£3.49m) from the transaction, but through his lack of fitness, he still cannot force his way into this new starting Rangers line-up.

In fairness to him, Pedro arranged his squad to start pre-season early due to a first-round Qualifying Europa League match which started far too early for Scottish teams to do themselves justice in the early rounds of this competition. In fact, Rangers were a disgrace when they were humbled by a part-time Luxembourg side that knocked them out of the competition at the first hurdle.

This is Peña’s first time out of Mexico and the midfielder is still trying to settle down in Scotland, but he has ticked off an ambition to play in Europe by making the move to Ibrox. He is a player that Gers boss Pedro Caixinha knows well from his time at Santos Laguna, and he feels he can do well in the SPL.

Pedro says:

“Carlos was playing for Leon in the play-offs and he was great. Since that moment I have been passionate about this player because he represents everything I want on the pitch in that number 8 position and he can give the team so much. Travelling from the back and arriving in the box, scoring goals and playing attractive fantastic football, I believe he can fit totally into our way of playing and our philosophy at this club and Scottish football as well.”

Peña told Rangers TV:

“I am very happy to become part of this great club that has such great supporters. Since I was a little boy I have wanted to play in Europe, but I haven’t really had the opportunity until now. Hopefully I will be able to make the most of it.”

He is a goal scoring midfield player and in his first spell with the club Peña netted 12 goals in 31 matches to help Leon win promotion via the play offs.
He moved to CD Guadalajara in Dec ‘15 in a deal worth an astonishing $8million and after a desperately disappointing first year Peña was returned back to Leon on loan in Dec ‘16.

He is a typical Central American midfielder who loves to run with the ball and attack teams from the middle of the park. He has also shown that he chips in with his fair share of goals from his favoured midfield position.

He’s not the tallest at 5ft 10 but is credited for being strong and commanding in the centre of the park. Reports at the time of the 2014 World Cup said he was one of the most influential players in Mexico, and is good at breaking up the opposition and starting his own attacks. He can also play on the left hand side if required.

With Ryan Jack and Graham Dorrans impressing so well centrally for Rangers, while the wings seem to be monopolised by Josh Windass, Daniel Candeias and Niko Kranjcar, when will we see actually Peña performing in a Rangers jersey and strutting his stuff at Ibrox in front of 51,000 supporters?

Hopefully something to look forward to.

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6 COMMENTS

  1. Can't wait to see him. He seems so highly rated abroad. I think he will take dorrans place, while dorrans will mine behind the striker .. be a more attacking team with goals coming from all over

  2. Yeah I'm looking forward to seeing Pena too, he looks like the kind of powerful, aggressive player we lacked last season. Looks good in the air as well considering his height. Another quality addition hopefully. Btw I wonder when we can expect to hear from our new DoF? Hope he can attract a few top youngsters from his old acadamy at Man City. Does anyone know anything about Jordan Critchley? 16 year old we signed from Queens Park (?) this week? Is he any good?

  3. Didn't realise we payed that much for him. He must be special. When was the last we went all out for a player and paid nearly £4m. Jelavic I think? Just hope so. Anything other than Halliday is a bonus

    • Haliday is doing well away, he was always being played in the writing position for us. One of the few games he was in the right place was against Celtic in the semi final and he was great. I think he might become a huge asset next season with better players around him and a prob dm behind which we now have

  4. He could be one of those players that needs time to adjust to the whole setup. Could be a slow starter. Different country. Different climate. New team. Different playing style etc so we need to let him find his feet over the course of a season. Might in fact be next season before we see the best of him. From what I've read I get the impression he's lost a bit of form and his confidence is low so might be another reason Pedro isn't rushing him to make things worse and will gradually introduce as a sub.

  5. Yea not sure how you link the question into Andy Halliday. How about getting behind the team including those out on loan.

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