“I’m a proud Celtic fan” – new Rangers target controversy…

As Rangers fans know, the Kyle Lafferty saga is starting to drag out. Some reports did claim a medical was lined up, but the source was Scott McDonald so we’re not exactly sure how much water that holds.

As such, Rangers have opened the options up a tad, and one name to surface according to the Sun and some other outlets is Ross McCormack, with a number of readers of Ibrox Noise expressing their opinion over this possible move.

The Scotland international is frozen out at current club Aston Villa and seeks a move away, with League One Sunderland joining the race to snap him up. But one of the major issues surrounding McCormack isn’t his ability, but his allegiances. A self-confessed Celtic fan, the 32-year old forward only has good words to say about Rangers, and his time here, but that his heart is and always will be in Parkhead.

He said some years ago:

“I’m a proud Celtic fan and always will be. But Rangers were the team to come in for me and I enjoyed my time there. That’s just how football works. I wanted to do well at Ibrox and did my best for Rangers. But I always supported Celtic as a kid and went to watch as many matches as I could.”

It’s by no means the first time a supporter of one side of the Old Firm has become a player for the other – Neil McCann, Scott Allan, Rod Stewart…

In terms of the merits of the move? He would be pretty much a free – we’d imagine Villa would be happy to get rid, so ‘mutual consent’ would appear on it, but given the standard Rangers now aspire to, is McCormack even good enough?

We’d loosely argue not – he was 5+ years ago, but those days are long gone. His recent stats might tell us 14 in 17 for the A-League down under last season, but four in 24 for Villa and Forest the season before is either a player struggling at that level now, past it, or just demotivated.

The SPL is no shrinking violet – and it is a tonne tougher than the A-League.

As a free on a modest wage we’d have no complaints. If Stevie can make a player out of some of the rabble in the squad already, he can get the best from a Scotland international too.

It depends if he wants him.