Yesterday’s Rangers exodus was the biggest mass release of club players in one day since 2015 and the huge swarm which left as Mark Warburton made sweeping changes.
Yesterday saw Greg Stewart, Bongani Zungu, Daniel Finlayson, Nathan Young-Coombes, Jamie Barjonas, Zac Butterworth, Ciaran Dickson, Dapo Mebude, Matthew Shiels, Harris O’Connor, Brian Kinnear and Nicky Hogarth all making their way out, 12 players no longer part of the club’s plans and headed to pastures new.
The big names in there of course are Stewart, Zungu, Young-Coombes, Barjonas and Mebude, players who for one reason or the other didn’t have what it takes despite fans being eager to see many of them in action.
This happens a lot at Rangers – players fans are especially in favour of, never getting the decent chances and ending up hurled out.
Truth? Rangers’ standards are just so high now, it’ll make it even harder for youth especially to get a chance, and harder for fringe players like Zungu and Stewart to get minutes.
We can’t argue with it. It won us 55 and two incredible UEL runs, so Stevie is evidently getting a tonne more right than wrong, but it will always be disappointing to see personal favourite players and indeed youth prospects not really being given a crack of the whip.
And now 12 players are officially gone and forging new careers for themselves elsewhere – indeed a few of those guys, such as Barjonas, have already found new gigs, and we wish them the best.
But yesterday really was a massive herd thinning at Ibrox and if we want to make a serious push for UCL, we need better squad players than Bongani Zungu.
And the club is working on it.