After his surprise selection in Porto last week, following his disappointingly limited display in Dragao Steven Gerrard not only removed Brandon Barker from the field, but the ex-Man City winger failed to even make the match day squad yesterday.
This was a bit of a blow for the 23-year old, especially after the notion from ourselves he could be a successful and useful squad member – omission entirely from even the bench yesterday was a bit of a critique from his manager that he was not good enough in Porto and didn’t even merit a place on the sidelines v Livi.
Maybe harsh, but Sheyi Ojo’s cameo yesterday from the dugout vindicated the choice from the manager, and the loanee had one of his better performances in a Rangers shirt for sure.
We put it to the readers recently, what exactly would you see Barker as long term in this Rangers era?
The results were interesting.
Only 4% agreed with Steven Gerrard’s decision to include him in the UEL squad for the group stage in the first place, a decision we feel which, in part, was punishment on Jordan Jones for his moment of madness against Celtic. The NI international could certainly have played a role towards the end of the group stage, but of course is ineligible.
And only 17% think he’s even good enough for the first team in any context, while 22% wouldn’t even have him at Ibrox in the first place.
The remaining audience, 56%, would have him as staple SPL squad, and nothing more.
We agree with that, and we think Gerrard does too, but excluding him after Thursday would have been quite a big blow to the winger. It’s up to him to prove he deserves to play a role again.
I don't think he'll ever be a player, we can't do without. But to be fair, I didn't see Borna bear amounting to anything, last season. Now look…
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