DMAA

And by the way I think Andrew Robertson is a gift to Celtic in terms of inflating Tierney's value. Suddenly there's an example of a Scottish left back who has gone all the way.

1 hour ago, JohnMc said:

To suggest Arsenal aren't good enough for him is deluded

It was hard to listen to tbh, I was just doing a wee run to the dump but couldn’t keep it on for long. They were seriously saying it would need to be a title challenger like Man City or Liverpool to take him away from the club he loves, winning silverware. And Turnbull is the next Iniesta too by the way. And Rangers did get a mention, we don’t have saleable assets like Celtic do. Fanzine is exactly the word. 

I was listening on Saturday and they were honestly saying Arsenal wasn’t a big enough club for Tierney. And I’m sure they said Celtic should hold out for £30m. It was like listening to a Celtic fans podcast. 

Barisic could do well in the 4-3-2-1 because he’ll be tasked with doing what he’s good at like Tav on the other side. Despite the criticism he could be brilliant this season. In games where we are under pressure defensively Flanagan comes in. Lowe not needed. 

Great news. Significantly improved the squad. Hard to say at this stage how much it impacts the starting line-up of course but certainly looks like he could displace any of the 3 centre mids. It’ll be interesting to see who leaves now out of Halliday, Holt, Dorrans, Rossiter and Docherty. 9 senior centre mids is crazy. 

1 hour ago, Frankie said:

I'd expect him to go on loan again but we're going to have a lot of games to play in August if we get to QR3 of the Europa League so he may be initially retained, especially if Morelos leaves before then.

Maybe it's just me but when we only play 1 striker I think 2 senior strikers are enough (Morelos & Defoe) and the 3rd should be a youth player like Rudden or Hardie. Waste of money paying Lafferty's wages.

1 hour ago, der Berliner said:

Well, they tell and relate what they are told. Usually from the Rangers camp. What goes on in the other club`s camp or with the player and his agent are the variables that remain unknown.

Yeh I just meant I was expecting those guys to be told he was signing today and they obviously haven’t benn. Looks like we won’t hear today. 

1 hour ago, der Berliner said:

Which should be the norm for any new signing, free or not, famous or otherwise.

Of course but it is reasonable to temper expectations. I thought Worrall did a fine job but was strongly disliked by a lot of our fans and had a much stronger CV than Edmundson. 

I was expecting Aribo to be announced today but the ITKers are very quite

10 minutes ago, buster. said:

Aug29th..EL 4th Rd. 2nd leg

Aug 31st..Celtic (H) 

That will move the Sep 1st. Last time we returned from Ufa to play at Parkhead after they had played at home on the Thursday. Hopefully this time we get the luck, that game was a huge one for the league despite being so early in the season.

On ‎20‎/‎06‎/‎2019 at 09:03, Bill said:

Personally, I’d prefer to see a U.K. FA, a U.K. league system and a U.K. national team. It’s the only way the game here will ever be pulled out of its ongoing corruption and endless decline.

There's absolutely no question about it. Rangers will never get back to where they were on the European stage again unless we join the English leagues. The only thing stopping it is nationalism.

5 minutes ago, Frankie said:

A tough start which may well define our chances of league success next season.

It's pretty easy compared to last season. The away fixtures this time are Kilmarnock, St Mirren & St Johnstone instead of Aberdeen, Celtic & Motherwell.

A good starts set the tone and is very importantly psychologically. You want our own players to be top of the league from day one and believe they are the best, and you want opposition players to believe the same and fear us. I think we have a good chance of getting off to a flyer with those fixtures.

36 minutes ago, buster. said:

One year extension to add onto the year he had left.

 

He's the same age (19) as David Turnbull.

 

Would he get a game for Motherwell if he went out on loan ?

@elfideldo

Yes but they won’t do that, developing their own players makes them money. Cammy Palmer is a player who has the potential to break through one day. The kind of centre mid who is everywhere and wins the ball back constantly. 

12 minutes ago, stewarty said:

Arguably by pitting those young players into games which are tighter, where the competition and consequences are real, is likely to increase the pace of development and allow the likes of Motherwell or Hearts to focus on those players who have the extra mental application that is needed to succeed at any level.  

Yes but the point made is really that Rangers can't risk playing these youngsters because we demand the highest standards whereas at Motherwell and Hearts it doesn't matter. This argument doesn't stand up scrutiny because those clubs take a big risk playing youngsters in tight and tough games where there is a lot to lose. Motherwell were 9th and not far off the play-off spot when they started playing Turnbull and Hastie. They are never cruising at 3-4 nil up with half an hour to play like we are. The point about regular first team football does apply of course but it's not true that it's harder for us to give them chances to play.

53 minutes ago, der Berliner said:

While clubs like Motherwell or Killie don't have the money and have to breed and play youngsters, ours have to be that extra wee bit special to impress the manager and get into a first team of seasoned pros

This theory only applies to a degree imo. It's true that youngsters can become first team regulars more easily when the quality of player is lower. However I don't really agree that it's easier for Motherwell or Hearts to blood youngsters than us. I can't remember the exact number but we won something like 15 games by at least 3 goals last season. I imagine Levein would love to be able to ease his youngsters in in those circumstances rather than chucking them in in what are almost always very close games which could result in Hearts dropping down the table. We could easily have given our youngsters loads of game time last season if we wanted to and we'd know far more about them. The problem is we've left no space in the squad for them.

3 hours ago, buster. said:

Agree,...keeping hold of him will obviously depend a lot on how the lad and his advisor/agent see the future.

 

One thing the Turnbull tansfer saga shows is a 19 year old provincial Scot able to effectively price himself out of the reach of Celtic. Taken alone, that is a positive for us but the bigger picture is more about how the financial gulf is affecting the market in the UK and it won't have gone unnoticed by McPake.

Turnbull has shown again althat 19 isn’t too young if you have the talent. McPake is about to turn 18 and imo could be ready for loan because when he reaches 19 I’d hope to see him making the bench. 

1 hour ago, Rousseau said:

 

An interesting read. However I'm skeptical of the idea that Aribo is a no 10. I think he is most similar to Ryan Jack in terms of what he aims to do for the team and I don't think he would be played in the Arfield/Kent position in the 4-3-2-1.

40 minutes ago, Gaffer said:

As the resident Kent fanboy (I think I may have been the only one on the forum)

Haha, you are much more reasonable than the fanboys on FF trust me.

2 hours ago, der Berliner said:

For a change, one or two trips NOT to the East would be good. Last season essentially defied belief, as we met one potential stumbling stone after another.

At least Celtic got the same bad luck as us. We’re going to Kosovo and they’re going to Sarajevo. 

3 hours ago, buster. said:

Roma's apparent interest in the lad would surely be on the back of the tournament success in the middle east

McPake was too old for the Alkass tournament but played all over Europe with the youths last season and will be well known to these big clubs. We need to keep hold of him, he's the long term answer to our no 10 problem in my opinion and won't cost us anything.

2 hours ago, Stevie - 4lads Blog said:

I expect Aribo & Kent (loan) to sign as noises very positive

I still can't believe we're trying to sign Kent with the number of attacking midfielders already on the books. Liverpool apparently looking for a hefty loan fee compared to last season too. Another season of me moaning about his lack of goals and assists and another season of all the fanboys saying "the goals and assists will come" and then decrying the usage of stats and americanisation of the game when they don't ? 

46 minutes ago, JohnMc said:

I knew almost nothing about this player until yesterday. A quick read up of course now makes me an expert on him

I watched his Youtube compilation so I similarly consider myself a bit of an Ojo expert. For me he has more ability than Kent. Better at dribbling and just as fast but the same question marks over end product. The bigger question will be application and attitude. If he can match Kent's then I think he could have a great season. 

2 hours ago, JohnMc said:

For me then this simply proves that despite the best efforts of our haters, and some of our own, you simply can't pigeon-hole the Rangers support. We're broad, we come from all over, we've no proscribed views on any subject except wanting Rangers to win

I was waiting for you to comment @JohnMc because like me you seem to have more exposure to Rangers fans outside the central belt bubble where all the anti-Rangers issues are magnified. Most Rangers fans in Scotland don't know what the BBC thing is all about, they don't know what our problem with the SFA is and they don't make it to many games. They still buy the strips for their kids and watch any Rangers games that are on tele and listen to them on the radio.

But the idea that the ordinary Rangers fan doesn't support Scotland sounds reasonable only to those who regularly frequent fans forums. To those who don't, they would probably think you meant Celtic fans.

I did a wee bit of maths and Kilmarnock got 8 points less in the second of the season than if they had performed the same as they did in the first half.

I said when we signed Jones that if we were looking at a Killie player it should be Stewart and I said that Killie would fall away without him. I made the mistake of underestimating Clarke obviously but 8 points more would have seen them finish only 3 points behind us.

They lost Stewart but brought in Alex Bruce, Mulumbu and a youth player from Liverpool so you could even say the loss of Stewart alone would have cost far more than 8 points if they hadn't brought in 3 decent players at the same time.

10 hours ago, pete said:

He is far too technical for Aberdeen. McInnes just wants cloggers.

Spot on @pete. Killie aren’t very technical but Clarke was clever enough to use him

properly. 

There are far more Rangers fans in the country than any other. Any result other than this would have been a shock.