It has been confirmed that Ianis Hagi’s absence from the Romanian squad for the Olympics was a Rangers veto and not a personal decision.
The attacker pled with Rangers to free him to represent his nation later this month, but national manager Mirel Radoi, in charge of Romania’s Olympic squad, has revealed he has failed to secure Hagi.
He said:
“I regret I am unable to include Ianis Hagi and, indeed, a lot of players on the original list. It clearly weakens my team considerably. It makes our task to try and get out of the group all the tougher, and we just have to accept clubs do not have to release their players for this tournament. It will be a very big challenge for us without our best players.”
There is no mention here of Hagi changing his mind, and the move by the club was clearly carried out with Kemar Roofe’s suspension for the qualifiers in mind.
Rangers will be a bit thin on the right for their return to the CL, with Roofe serving a ban, and Hagi is the only real replacement Rangers actually have for that slot, with a plethora of left wingers available but absolutely nothing for the right.
So, unfortunately for the Romanian, his request for Olympics had to be denied – despite this, the pre-season footage from Auchenhowie does show his spirits high so he appears to be taking that on the chin and can look forward to playing in the Champions League instead.
Not a bad consolation.
Tough decision but the correct one. Hagi is young and I’m sure the opportunity to play in a big tournament will come along again. It’s not as if he was Scottish.
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