Eight of Steven Gerrard’s Rangers signing have been clear failures, according to a BBC broadcaster.
Pundit and journalist Tom English ripped into the 20 players recruited since Gerrard took over as manager last summer and insisted the jury is still out on a number of recruits in addition to those he claims have been flops.
“There are a number of others where the jury’s still out. There’s very, very few absolute success stories in all of those players.
“He’s signed I think 20, if you take Jamie Murphy, [Matt] Polster and the goalie Andy Firth out of it, that’s 17 players who have got game time.
“What is that about? What does that say about what’s coming through the ranks at Rangers if you feel you need to sign three centre halves in Steven Gerrard’s brief time at the club.”
OPINION
Assessing the signings brought to Ibrox during Gerrard’s reign is a multi-faceted issue. Some were in place before his appointment – ironically, two of the most successful in free transfers Scott Arfield and Allan McGregor – while others clearly have the stamp of director of football Mark Allen on them. This is an era when managers do not overall responsibility for recruitment, often merely providing the final green light. While we can guess that someone like Jermain Defoe would not have headed to Ibrox without his former England teammate and an icon of the British game at the helm, others could have had little to do with the manager. Was it his decision to bring in Grezda, Borna Barisic and Nikola Katic from eastern Europe? That could have been the work of a single agent, or agency, in cahoots with Allen and the board. Nevertheless, it does not reflect well on Gerrard that, with the club’s title and trophy hopes now up in smoke, so many of the players are deemed failures.