With Ryan Kent inevitably leaving this summer, Aberdeen may well have found Rangers’ replacement already in 23-year-old LuÃs Henriques de Barros Lopes or ‘Duk’ as he’s known.
An international with Cape Verde, this Portuguese-born attacker has been impressing SPFL fans all season, and his stats are more impressive than anyone in his position with 18 goals and 6 assists in 38 appearances, making him one of the most coveted players in the league.
And clearly he’s up to the challenge and rigours of the Scottish Premiership so is he one Michael Beale will be keeping an eye on?
Absolutely – the Hispanic star’s contract runs for another couple of years, meaning his market value, probably in the £3M-£5M range, is of interest to Rangers given that’s the typical price for the Premiership’s best players.
Some fans react with horror and mockery at the idea of £5M for Lawrence Shankland, but Scott McKenna cost Nottingham Forest that, and Doig and Ferguson cost Verona and Bologna more than that respectively, ditto Hickey.
So Rangers fans who think the best players in the league should be around £2M tops are being very naïve and seem to believe the inflation of prices affects everything in the world except footballers in the SPL.
No, if Michael Beale was to attempt to replace Kent with the prolific winger/attacker, he wouldn’t get him for buttons.
Is he one we at Ibrox Noise want? Yes, we see no issue hoovering up the best the SPL has, Walter Smith did it to great effect many times back in the day so if there’s a good player who can already handle the SPL, we’d suggest bringing him in.
Will he take us to greater heights?
Well Lewis Ferguson is currently strolling Serie A, and apparently he wasn’t good enough for Rangers, so we’re not sure of the criteria for that one really…
No, Duk would be a worthwhile addition. What about Miovski? Nesbitt? Van Veen?
There are some decent players in our league, and getting the best of them isn’t the worst idea. Does someone need to be from a foreign league to be a worthwhile signing?