The cold reality of having unwanted players on long term contracts is starting to hit home at Ibrox as they face upto another summer like 2024.
Dating back to summer 2022 when Giovanni van Bronckhorst and Ross Wilson secured Ridvan Yilmaz, Ben Davies and Rabbi Matondo the Ibrox club has been stockpiling players on wages that other clubs wouldn’t touch.
A year later Micky Beale went on an even more disastrous spending spree, seven matches into the SPFL season with defeats from Celtic and a 5-1 Champions League hammering from PSV Eindhoven on his ledger it was time up for the Brains Behind Gerrard.
One of Beale’s final signings was Jose Cifuentes, a midfielder that would take the club to the next level with the bonus of having previously been linked with Celtic.
Being a complete no-mark Beale had to talk his own brilliance up at every opportunity, announcing the signing of Cifuentes BBC Scotland reported him saying:
I was originally aware of him when he broke through in Ecuador and I have followed him on his journey with LAFC in the MLS.
He is a midfielder who can play in a variety of roles, both as a box-to-box player and in a more defensive role. He has excelled in the MLS and for his national team.
When I returned to Rangers, he was a name that was immediately discussed and one that we knew we would have a lot of competition to overcome if we were to sign him. When meeting to discuss the move, it was clear that we are aligned in our thinking and on his further development.
I am delighted we have Jose here at Rangers and I must thank everyone involved in the process of making this transfer a reality
Two years on there is no competition or interest in Cifuntes, like Sam Lammers, Cyriel Dessers and Danilo the midfielder from Ecudaor is just another expensive mistake on Beale’s CV and the Ibrox payroll.
Lammers, Connor Goldson, Todd Cantwell, Scott Wright and Robbie McCrorie were sold for combined fees of £810,000 a year ago even though the messengers claimed that £2m had been spent on Lammers with £1.5m coming in from the fifth best team in Cyprus for Goldson.
Now that painful process is underway, ARIS Thessalonica had a £3.5m option to buy Cifuentes after a loan spell to Brazil had bombed, they declined that with the midfielder pictured back at Ibrox over the weekend.
Covering the unwanted ‘star’ today the Daily Record reports:
Diario Expreso in South America say that both Rangers and Cifuentes are open to terminating the two remaining years on his contract to allow the Ecuadorian to find a new club for free.
It’s suggested that Cifuentes has struggled to integrate with the group at Ibrox, and that a return to MLS could be on the cards if he is permitted to leave on a free transfer. We understand Cifuentes is keen to stay but that view isn’t shared by the Ibrox club according to reports.
Rangers seemingly don’t believe they’ll be able to land a fee for Cifuentes so are happy just to get him off the wage bill as Martin rebuilds things at Ibrox.
And there are plenty more in the same situation, with agents well aware of what went on over the departures last summer.
Most loyal bears expected an end of season clear out, when they attended Sunday’s friendly against Club Brugge the team sheet looked depressingly familiar.
Not only were the serial losers still around but they were joined by Kieran Dowell with Davies and Matondo calling off through injury.
A dozen players could leave without a negative impact on the squad- unfortunately with contracts to run and no chance of getting the same wages elsewhere it will be a costly exercise to get rid of previous flops while Russell Martin stocks up on more expensive journeymen from the Championship and League One.
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