Rangers fought off stiff competition to hold onto Nathan Patterson, rejecting a bid from Everton believed to be in the region of £8million, not bad for a player with just 19 first-team appearances.
It is the latest indication that we are heading in the right direction, not too long ago we had Lee Hodson as our back up right-back and he certainly wasn’t valued anywhere near the Scotland international.
The link to Everton was a strong one with rumours that they could return in January for the 19-year old, although they will need to dig a lot deeper to prise him from Ibrox, a move that former Rangers defender Michael Ball, speaking to Football Transfer Tavern, has backed as a good bit of business if they can pull it off:
“I think it’s good that Everton are looking north of the border and trying to be clever.
We all like big signings, we all like the big name players but moving forward, it’s a mixture of trying to bring in players from the academy, a bit of youth from elsewhere, who can compete in every position, as well as your bigger signings and Nathan is really highly thought of at Rangers.”
Ball is right, if Patterson was English you’d be looking at a fee of more than double what Everton offered, the Scottish Premiership is a market where quality players can be cherry picked for relative peanuts when you consider some of the fees paid – even in the second tier – down south.
Clubs will be looking to get in early with Patterson having seen how much Kieran Tierney went for across the city after a few seasons in the first-team, at the same age you’d struggle to find an argument that the Rangers defender isn’t, at least, as good as the Arsenal man.
It’s a sign of the times that we will be unlikely to see a repeat of the career of Barry Ferguson where a player comes through the ranks and stays for years, with James Tavernier still having years of good service ahead of him, we might never see Patterson as first choice, if clubs like Everton have their way.