It’s a story as old as time itself.
A manager leaves one club and then, instantly, has every decent player from their old club linked with a move following them to whoever they joined.
Given Rangers position in the food chain, its an easy assumption to make that Steven Gerrard might consider several of his former players as possible signing targets seeing as he knows their quality and knows that thy would cost a fraction of players south of the border.
One name being linked is Nathan Patterson, the Gers youngster continuing to shine on the international stage this week with a stunning goal and assist against Moldova, that he doesn’t play regularly for Rangers is no shame when you consider that James Tavernier has 3 goals and 11 assists so far this season.
One source, 90min.com, has claimed that not only are Aston Villa keen on tempting Ross Wilson with an offer, but some of Europe’s biggest clubs are too:
“Gerrard is currently assessing his Villa players, but he already believes pursuing Patterson and Kamara should be amongst the club’s transfer priorities.
“He also believes that if the Villans want to land Patterson, then they need to tie up a deal in January as some of Europe’s elite are now pursuing the 20-year-old.
“We previously revealed that Manchester United had joined Everton in the chase for the youngster, and the Red Devils even considered a bid for him late in the summer after failing to get Kieran Trippier.
“Now we can confirm that some of the continent’s top clubs have also been watching Patterson this season, including Bayern Munich, Atletico Madrid and Paris Saint Germain.”
If that report is even remotely accurate, whoever wants him will have to bid an awful lot more than the £5million that Everton had rejected in the summer, yes, he might only be our second choice right-back at present but – if he wanted to – he could be at Rangers for the rest of his career.
Alan Hutton left Ibrox for a record £9m nearly 15 years ago, Patterson is every bit as good as him and will only get better when he is playing regularly, Kieran Tierney left Celtic for £25m after establishing himself for club and country and there is nothing to suggest that the Rangers youngster can’t reach the same levels given what we have seen so far.
Any potential deal will be full of clauses, if we decide to sell him, and much of the decision will fall at the feet of the player and whether or not he wants to bide his time at Rangers or if he wants to spread his wings – moving to one of the clubs mentioned would invariably see him earn more money but I’m not entirely sure he would get more game time – it’s just a shame that he couldn’t have been a centre-half of the same quality rather than playing in the same position as our best player and captain.