There’s a fair bit to digest with Michael Beale’s Europa League selection, but the big omission of course is that of Ridvan Yilmaz.
The Turk has been dumped out of the European picture for this season, coming on the same day his former club president at Besiktas Ahmed Nur Cebi extoled his virtues and proclaimed this season to be Ridvan’s.
First of all, let’s check what he said:
“It was always the plan for Ridvan to take a year to get used to Scottish football. He is a young player and he needs time to adapt. He is still our player and we are confident that he will be a success at Rangers.”
We’re not quite sure what he means by ‘still our player’ unless that’s the Turkish version of ‘one of our own’ but clearly the football chief reckons that Ridvan will have his season this campaign.
So his omission from the UEL squad is eye opening and possibly a little troubling for the left back.
See, his injury problems appear to have returned, having basically missed a tonne of football on his maiden season with various pulls and bruises, and there’s no information on when the defender is expected back.
He was supposed to be available ‘by the Morton game’ so said Michael Beale but as we know that didn’t really happen and Borna Barisic has heavily implanted himself as first-choice again following that bright cameo the Turk had during last season’s Split.
But his absence from the UEL squad is not great, and not what he’d have wanted at all.
The question is is this tactical, or is it injury-related?
Ridvan is a talented player who has shown plenty of signs of his quality, but for love nor money we can’t seem to get consistency out of him or a run out of him, and the latest symptom of his struggles to truly breach the first team is this omission.
We do hope Yilmaz can put this behind him and go on a proper run soon.