Steven Gerrard made a big decision last night – and it paid off…

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Steven Gerrard made a big decision last night – and it paid off…


As readers chewing on our content since last night will see, it’s a mixed reaction – there was a lot of good for sure, and we’ve also given a few blots as well.

But one definite good was the dropping of Joe Aribo.

This midfielder has been a total disappointment since his much-hyped move north. He was sold as a special player who could scale the heights of the multimillion values, but despite a promising peak where he had a decent friendly outing with a goal v Ukraine for his country, Aribo hasn’t delivered anything like that in a Rangers shirt.

And his omission from the Rangers team was as much a good move from Gerrard as it was a surprise – we had the giant CM as a Gerrard favourite, a potential ‘undroppable’ and that no matter how he played, he would start.

Well, his place on the bench last night assured us the manager is taking stock of one of his big summer signings’ poor displays and is now managing it.

Glen Kamara instead took that slot and while it still didn’t quite achieve his split level, he nevertheless looked like he really wanted to grab the opportunity, and had probably his best display of the season as a result.

Aribo, frankly, doesn’t look all that much better than Kamara has been this season – the Nigerian produces fleeting moments of quality, but not enough, and not enough to justify continued selection.

And his manager may just have run out of patience.

In Aribo’s defence, he actually played maturely for a 23-year old who’s never performed at this level – he would have been gutted not to start, having admitted UEL was a major carrot for him to come north. He did produce a decent cameo in his 10 minute appearance – and now that he knows he is capable of being dropped, it may give him the kick up the backside he needs to drop the complacency.

Neither he nor Kamara are especially outstanding right now, but the latter certainly made a reasonable claim for a place last night.

Then again, there’s also another guy called Greg Docherty…

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8 COMMENTS

  1. i think its a bit too soon to be bad mouthing Aribo, if you remember last year Kent didn't exactly set the field alight early on and look at how he progressed, way too negative here guys give the boy a chance judge him at Xmas i think you will be eating your words by then, try getting behind the team instead of picking it to bits, think of where we were before under Pedro etc

  2. Aribo will come good perhaps late this season definitely next. Docherty continues to wait his turn he will get chances too especially in Scottish Games . Everything moving in the right direction …Katic situation a worry as this lad has real potential both for us Croatia and for sell on potential . Concerning!!!

    • Docherty can do some right. His response and handling of the spitting incident in Ballymena was worthy of a Rangers captain and deserves praise. I would love to see him get his chance and grab it but I fear there are too many players ahead of him at the moment.

  3. To say he was a total disappointment is way over the top,he started off not bad and scored a couple of good goals that's not a total disappointment you said the same thing about barisic and now your singing his praises,please get a grip

  4. I don't understand how players can do so well on international duty and not, for us. But to be fair, I can't understand how we have so much injuries in a season, compared to Celtic. What are they doing differently? Or are we just cursed with bad luck? I agree with BillB, Aribo will come good. He better…lol.

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