New contract on table for Rangers ‘target’ – another case of using Rangers’ name

Is Nicola Raskin and his agent yet another case of using Rangers to get a better deal, or indeed deal at all, with their current club?

After a multitude of players linked with a Bosman move to Ibrox, the latest example was Kenny McLean, who had no interest in a switch north to Glasgow, just a new contract at Carrow Road, and his and his agent’s mischief-making worked as Norwich gave him an extension.

And Raskin, out of contract in the summer, is another whose agent bigged up the idea of him leaving to Rangers, while also nudging strongly at his current club, Standard Liege, to come to the table with an offer.

And that’s exactly what he’s managed to get according to Belgian media, as one of their outlets allege Liege will hold talks with Raskin amid interest from Rangers, Spezia, Brugge and Olympiakos, which is a pretty clever combination of clubs that are believable, mostly big, and sometimes more modest.

We doubt there’s any interest on the Belgium man’s part to leave his home country, just a new contract, and his agent appears to be doing sterling work feeding false rumours out there about a bunch of clubs, with Brugge and Rangers being by far the biggest, being interested in taking him as a free.

Ergo forcing Liege’s hand in offering the boy a new deal or face losing him for absolutely nothing given he’s got a market value of around £10M.

So many players have done this, had ‘leave to Rangers’ rumours funnelling out, all to get the new deal as their present terms close in on expiry date, as Raskin’s is.

Indeed, our current players are the opposite – Kent and Morelos have been offered new deals, but aren’t interested in signing as things stand, but as Douglas Park has suggested, they want more money and we’re not raising the offer. No clubs are ‘reported’ as interested which might suggest the same tactic wasn’t needed here.

As for Raskin – expect a new deal extension for the Belgian imminently as the predictable Rangers namedropping tactic works yet again.