As Ibrox Noise discussed earlier, there’s a rumour doing the rounds about Vancouver Whitecaps and Bayern Munich legend Thomas Muller.
As we hinted, there’s more than a speck of silly season to it, but in reality, would he be of use?
Age
He’s 36, which is surely a black mark, but he’s very much shining in the USA (well, Canada) and has 13 goals and assists in 13 matches.
He is leaps and bounds a class above the normal fodder that plays in North America. It’s a weak league the MLS, and probably comparable to the Premiership in many respects.
So would he be useful in Govan?
He’s an AM. A 10. A second striker. A versatile forward who will always be dangerous in the final third, and Rangers have nothing there.
Chermiti, Aasgaard and Moore. We don’t have a good playmaker or any decent second striker. So yes, Muller would have a field day here.
But there is one simple reason why this signing isn’t happening.
Why
Before we get to that, the reason Rangers are being mentioned here is the Rohl Flick Bayern connection.
Because Muller used to strut his stuff rather well for the Bundesliga giants under Flick and Rohl, leading to 2+2=5.
That’s where this is coming from.
Rohl probably does have Muller’s details, but the chances of getting him to Govan based on relationships is zero.
Why?
Wage
Because Thomas Muller’s wage is about to increase from £15,000pw to more like £100K and he will have no desire to miss out on that. We’re not about to bore you with the details but it’s a bonus based on MLS pay structure.
So unless he decides he doesn’t want £100,000 a week and would rather get a heck of a lot less in Govan, this is a non-starter.
Danny Rohl’s Bayern connections count for squat. Same with his Barca Flick angle.
Rangers will not get anything from that, simply because Scottish football is not somewhere big stars generally want to go.
Fantasy
While things are a bit better on the Rangers front these days, and we did brilliantly to get the three signings we’ve managed so far, let’s not turn subtle improvement into utter fantasy.
We know this is silly season, but Thomas Muller is quite happy in North America on his imminent fortune about to arrive.
He probably isn’t keep on ditching that for a £20K pw wage under his former assistant manager who’s the same age as he is.