The name Marco Van Ginkel is familiar to Ibrox Noise – we take a keen interest in European football and noted with interest his brief spell at Italian giants Milan, a side like Rangers who are traditionally expected to win but since 2012 have mostly been also-rans in their league, despite, like Rangers, winning a title in the past few years.
MVG was only 21 back then, and he was abysmal. He didn’t last.
He was atrocious at Chelsea as well, and didn’t last long there either.
The one club, and fleetingly at that, that the former Dutch international has shone at is PSV, who have the same demands in Holland that Rangers do in Scotland. He was excellent in 2018 for them, and decent in 2016 for them.
But this, to us, screams of a better-known Sam Lammers, a well-known player but who still sees his ‘glory’ days as something long gone and of a distant past – 4lads followed this guy and a bunch of other sources have backed Rangers’ interest up.
In this case Van Ginkel is now 32, and remains a bit of a hybrid between an CM and an AM.
There’s the easy ‘usual’ conclusion fans make of ‘he’ll stomp all over the SPL’ – despite the number of times big names haven’t.
He’s a free agent, and Rangers absolutely short on 8s and 10s, both of which he basically is.
But for a bit of a playmaker and 325 career appearances, 40 assists is diabolical.
He scores more goals true, probably a bit more of a Frank Lampard type overall, but we’re not sure he’d fit Ibrox.
He had an average season last campaign, 7 goals in 32, 2 assists, with Vitesse, but we know his results are generally quite mixed playing under the kind of pressure Rangers offer.
He’d be a free, so there’s low risk here, but we can’t say he blows us away as a name.
We’ll see if Rangers’ interest in here is real – the only one who says it isn’t is a Hibernian fan.