The “Josh Windass Phenomenon”

We’ve noticed another groundswell building up by readers of Ibrox Noise and fans at large – the ‘Josh Windass Phenomenon’.

Only a month ago Josh was the toast of fans. Scoring for fun, assisting similarly and picking up a well-deserved February Player of the Month for the SPL.

Now we actually have fans glad he got injured (we don’t subscribe to this) in order to get him out of the team.

It is true – he doesn’t offer a lot as a team player in any sense when he is not scoring or assisting – we have described his contribution as that of a ‘passenger’ when he is not in his zone.

And currently he is indeed playing like the pre-Murty Windass, the one who made no impact on matches and fans wanted to run out of the club.

But the difference? Back then he was out of position on the left wing under Pedro; now he’s in his best position and doesn’t have that excuse.

We find the whole Windass situation bizarre – we have changed in our opinion of him down the years here on the site. Some of us like him, some love him, some hated him, and he grew on others.

And we all accept he’s not pulling his weight right now and isn’t giving the club much.

But only three matches ago this kid scored with one of the best finishes a Rangers player has produced against Celtic in years. Barely 360 minutes later everyone hates him?

Players have dips. It happens. Windass is an impact player – put him in his best position and he does damage to the opposition by and large, but he is also only human and won’t produce his best every single match.

Do we like the kind of player he is? Not really, but we want what’s best for the team and when he scores and assists, that’s best for the team. He’s effective.

We get told off a lot by our readers (including more than a few insults) for ‘turning on players’ or not backing them – we back all our players, even if we don’t like all of them. It’s well on record we don’t like Morelos, and haven’t for months (hard to take to someone as sour-faced and who’s admitted repeatedly he wants to leave) – but we accepted his place in the team as long as he was doing good work. And we praised the good work he did.

And yet some fans are slaughtering Windass who has never made noises about leaving and when in the zone is one of the most dangerous players in the SPL?

As we said earlier before, the problem of Graham Dorrans may already be solved with Windass’ injury, depending on severity, and we guess in some supporters’ minds the ‘problem’ of Windass has been solved too on the same Richter scale.

But Rangers are a better prospect with a fit and in form Windass in the side.