Rangers could be set to finally land of the club’s longest-running transfer pursuits after the former interest in Millwall’s Jake Cooper was reignited by new manager Michael Beale, himself a big admirer of the Den stopper.

The 27-year old famously signed a ‘long term deal’ when Steven Gerrard joined at Rangers in 2018, the-then 23-year old signing on, ending Rangers’ interest after a £3M bid from Gerrard was rejected that summer. The deal was further extended in 2020 till 2023, and of course, that is now where we are, with Cooper free to speak to new clubs in January.

There’s an argument to be made that Cooper never quite hit his true potential, staying in the Championship for his whole career up till now, but if the lad is to finally join a big club, the time is now.

Of course, following Kenny McLean’s mischievous agent using Rangers’ name to secure a new deal for his client at Norwich we can’t necessarily know for sure that Cooper wants to do anything other than extend yet again at the Den.

But he is now in out of contract territory and if a defender of his quality wants to make the step up to a truly big club, this is definitely the time to do it.

Beale is certainly an admirer, he and Gerrard trying to sign Cooper to Ibrox for that £3M four years ago, only to be knocked back based on the price of his escape clause being double that – of course his contract is immaterial now, and this is definitely a defender the manager has admired for some time.

He also has a glorious privilege we’ve not touched on – he’s barely missed a single match in his career through injury. This lad is never, EVER injured – think Tavernier and Goldson and you’re on the right lines.

For a club beset by injury blight, Jake Cooper would be a fantastic addition. Let’s hope Rangers can make this one happen at last and fans can finally see why we wanted to bring him in four years ago in the first place.