Philippe Clement has confirmed Rangers striker Danilo will effectively miss the season with his injury and surgery, after announcing he won’t be available again till the ‘final weeks of the season’.
Speaking at his pre-Dumbarton presser, the manager confirmed Danilo’s status is at best unchanged from previous, and at worst actually more severe, with his earlier projection of a couple of months being optimistic at best.
The Brazilian will not be back till May, as far as we can tell, and he will naturally be a hundred years away from being close to match fitness.
So that basically means we can more or less count him out until pre-season, which resets all the fitness for all players and puts everyone back on an even footing.
It’s disappointing.
In truth, Danilo has been a poor signing in terms of value. Two massive injuries in quick succession have stopped him gaining any momentum, and while he has very decent stats (11 goals and assists in 21) his total minutes are barely at a thousand, and we’ve not eve mentioned the £2M a year (£40K pw) he’s on either.
He isn’t a big target man, can’t hold up play, and overall his finishing is very hit and miss at best.
And yet, just like fellow struggler Cyriel Dessers, those stats are decent, and have been delivered in both Europe and domestically. Both of these strikers have got goals and assists and have absolutely contributed with them.
It’s just not really clicked overall for either of them, and Danilo, having started just 10 of his 21 starts, will likely miss the rest of the campaign.
A great use of £6M.