OPINION
Rangers have been one step ahead of their rivals on a number of occasions since Mark Allen took over as the director of football.
The extensive summer recruitment was clear-headed and shrewd, with some excellent acquisitions supplemented by some more-than-decent ones.
Allan McGregor, Jon Flanagan and Scott Arfield have proven to be impressive free transfers, the likes of Conor Goldson, Borna Barisic, Kyle Lafferty and Nikola Katic have been upgrades in their positions and Rangers also made smart use of the loan market through the captures of Ryan Kent, Ovie Ejaria, Joe Worrall and Lassana Coulibaly.
Only Eros Grezda has been a disappointment of those who came for a fee, partly due to injury, although he has time to come good, while Umar Sadiq has looked well below the required standard.
The gratifying thing for Rangers fans, after similarly impressive work in January, when the likes of Jamie Murphy and Glenn Middleton were recruited, is that the recruitment is not based on which agents the manager knows or players he previously worked with in a totally different league.
This bodes well for the forthcoming window, when manager Steven Gerrard has suggested the club are set to further reinforce a squad that has already undergone an extensive overhaul in both of Allen’s first two windows.
The Glasgow giants’ most recent set of accounts demonstrated the club are reliant upon directors’ loans for transfers and strengthening their squad unless, of course, there is a big-money sale.
Don’t rule out that possibility, with James Tavernier and Alfredo Morelos the two prize assets, but there is a sense Rangers are going clearly in the right direction.
Given Allen’s record, fans should be very excited ahead of January.