Gheorghe Hagi’s mental ego has kicked in after Rangers star Ianis Hagi’s legendary father slammed Romania for daring to leave his son out of the upcoming qualifiers, despite the evident fact his recovery is ongoing and he remains behind in match fitness.
The attacking midfielder is slowly starting to regain his place in the matchday squad at Ibrox, but he remains a fair bit below the needed match fitness at Scottish Premiership level and is a distance away from starting a match, but that hasn’t stopped Hagi senior slaughtering Edward Iordănescu, the national coach, for omitting Hagi junior.
He said:
“I don’t want the Romanian public to be misinformed here. The fact is the national manager called Ianis when he was injured to tell him he is a very important player for the team. Now Ianis is fit, he apparently cannot get into the team. He was not even named on the preliminary list. It’s clear to me Ianis is obviously not that important to the team. If he was, he would certainly have been called up. When the player is told directly that it is very important, I wonder why he is then missing? It’s simple – he is clearly not that big a deal for the manager.”
We don’t even know where to start with this delusional nonsense.
First of all, Hagi, as we said, is NOT match fit – he’s getting there slowly, but given the nature of his surgery the trek back to where he needs to be is a long one. He’s now physically fit, but being up to match pace is a different kettle of fish entirely. Therefore doing that at international level is even tougher, and there is no way recently-returned Hagi is even remotely ready for Romanian duty.
Secondly, even if Hagi senior was correct, the astonishing brass neck on him to demand his son be called up, to expect to manage the national team for Iordănescu is utterly comical – that he has a divine right to be called up and that’s all there is to it.
And then to suggest that the national manager views Hagi as not that big a deal… so what?! If the national boss doesn’t rate Hagi junior, isn’t that his right as a coach? We can disagree with a manager, but Gheorghe appears to be denying the national coach his opinion as well as wanting to do his job for him.
Of course, let’s be reasonable here – it’s his son, and he’ll do anything and say anything for his son’s interests, and any parent would, but there’s also being sensible about it and awaiting patiently for Hagi junior to be fully ready to return to the national side.
Not something his father seems willing to do.