In a brief 60+ minute cameo, brand new Rangers winger Oscar Cortes not only announced himself instantly Rangers’ best in that position by a country mile, but justified immediately the reputation he came with and then some.
Forget your ‘it was only Ayr United’ patter, this was a team not only out for blood but who made it extremely difficult for the hosts to break down the low block.
But the most telling part is no one else aside John Souttar remotely had a good game yesterday and ‘if it was only Ayr United’ why didn’t Silva, Diomande, Wright etc shine like beacons and boss it as well with one eye closed?
No, this was not an easy match, and we saw more out of Cortes than the rest of the team pretty much combined.
So where do we begin?
Was it his hunger, his constant running, his dribbles, his ACTUALLY BEATING MEN? The assist? The crossing? The pace?
Cortes is already leaps and bounds Rangers’ most potent attacker in terms of excitement and danger factor, and without smearing Ross McCausland, he’s on a different planet to Rangers’ NI international, who’s the same age.
Cortes is the kind of winger Rangers need, an almost instant Rangers Level winger who showed in a single cameo appearance why he has 10 appearances and 6 goals and assists in France with Lens.
He only didn’t fit there because he’s a winger and for some reason they signed him when they don’t actually use wingers.
Rangers do.
Cortes single-handedly fixed Rangers’ wing problem – it’s now Cortes first choice (until he gets injured of course) and partnered by one of McCausland, Matondo, Wright or Lawrence, we suppose.
Of course it doesn’t work like that, it’ll be rotation (except Tav and Goldson, obviously) as it usually is under Clement – the manager does rotate (most) players quite well.
But Cortes instantly installed himself as a first-teamer at Rangers and a class above all other wingers at the club.
Not that it was hard – Ibrox Noise has moaned for weeks+ how poor the quality out there was – Matondo, McCausland, Lawrence and Wright are the other options:
Matondo is dangerous, and effective in patches, but not popular, and he hasn’t really made his proper mark on the team yet. McCausland hasn’t kicked on from November and despite a lot of fans liking him because he’s one of our own, he’s simply not good enough yet and can’t beat anyone. Lawrence is injured too much and can only be used sparingly – he also can’t beat men and has no pace – more of a 10. Wright is woeful.
What we’re thinking now is Cortes as first choice can help to raise the level of both Matondo and McCausland.
Cortes is showing Rangers wingers how it’s done, and despite it ‘only being Ayr United’ no one else could.
Welcome to Ibrox Oscar.