The Scottish Player of the Year nominations have been announced, and Jack Butland and James Tavernier both vie for the gong from Rangers, alongside Hearts’ Lawrence Shankland and Celtic’s Matt O’Riley.

Hot off the back of Butland’s success in winning the club award last night, as voted by fans, it sees him in line again for such a prize, although, as mentioned earlier, Theo Snelders in 1989 was the last goalie in the top flight to claim that nod.

We would be very surprised if either Rangers candidate wins the award, with Shankland having had a sensational season and dragging Hearts almost single-handedly into third.

We couldn’t tell you much about O’Riley, aside him being an attacking midfielder who’s high up on the top scorers chart and plays for Denmark.

The reality is goalies just don’t win this award, and Tavernier doesn’t deserve it. He was strong up till December but since then has badly declined and has been close to very poor for the majority of 2024.

We analysed his performance up till the end of last year and he was justifiably among the top three players overall in the league in so many key areas, but that has declined since then and his defending plummeted while his goal rate has also gone notably south.

Butland? As we say, it’s not happened for a goalie since the late 80s, and we can’t see that changing.

It’ll either be Shankland or O’Riley.

It is very telling though that Rangers got two nominees – and neither of them have a thing to do with Philippe Clement’s arrival.

Indeed, we have a report on Clement in the next entry, but for now, Tav and Butland up for the national award.

But we don’t see either of them nabbing it.