Rangers face Aberdeen on Tuesday and still the question of John Souttar and his arrival hangs in the air.
Hearts have made it pretty clear they’re open to him leaving now, but they want £500,000 and significant add ons.
We imagine the addons are the usual appearance payments and a potential sell on fee, but the point is Rangers desperately need defensive bolstering, and Souttar is himself extremely keen to arrive in Govan this month.
Rangers want him now too, and Hearts are willing to sell, so should Rangers match the price asked?
The phrase ‘needs must as the devil drives’ is appropriate here.
For whatever reason Niko Katic isn’t returning, Connor Goldson’s future is up in the air, Leon Balogun’s fitness is unreliable, Filip Helander isn’t due back for a few weeks and Calvin Bassey is only an ‘ok’ centre back and not spectacular.
As such, the question of Souttar’s arrival urgency looms larger, and we’d suspect it’s better to just give Hearts what they want, as we did with Bournemouth’s Jack Simpson and Aberdeen’s Scott Wright, in order to have that extra option in defence.
Of course the irony here is we’re signing an injury-prone player to cover other injury-prone players, but hey, them’s the way the cookie crumbles.
Pay? Yes, we’d say as long as it’s within our means, pay what they want.
We need him.
Not sure I agree as much as I’d love to see him in now. Hearts could have had their shop in order to avoid a situation like this and put him up for transfer if they thought he might be willing or liable to run his contract down. Half a million is still a big deal with our deficit and once you take add ons we could be making Hearts get a really good deal for someone who can walk through the door for free at the end of the season. The only worry I have is his ability to stay injury free until then. Hearts are likely to back down on their price the closer we get to the end of the window. If Goldson leaves this window though then they need to get back to the table.
Its his achillies he ruptured, 3 times. Twice in one foot, once in the other lol.
Offer £200,000 with NO add ons. Hearts can accept or refuse and get nothing and have a player getting pelters every week from his own fans. We can spend £500,000 better elsewhere. In my opinion we got no benefit from money spent on bringing in Wright and Simpson for money this time last year. Balogun is fit again and Helander isn’t far behind. I believe Sands can play there too and King must be close to making the step up. That should see us through the remainder of this season.
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