Craig Levein backs Rangers player for main international role
Craig Levein has backed Rangers keeper Jon Mclaughlin to establish himself as number one for the Light Blues and Scotland.
The 32-year-old is currently away with his country for their Nations League games but didn’t feature in the 1-1 draw against Israel on Friday.
David Marshall started instead, despite Mclaughlin’s superb start to life at Rangers in which he has kept five clean sheets in-a-row.
Levein claims that Mclaughlin is the right age for a keeper and that he could establish himself as Scotland’s number one.
“Jon would be the best age,” he told the Daily Record.
“Marshall is experienced and McCrorie is quite young. Jon is 32 and that is fairly young in goalkeeping terms.
“I think he is capable of becoming No. 1 for Rangers and Scotland but we will need to wait and see.”
Mclaughlin has been superb since arriving from Sunderland, and Gerrard will surely have been delighted with his impact on the club.
Allan McGregor started the season in goal at Aberdeen, but picked up an injury against Bayer Leverkusen in the Europa League, opening the door for the former Black Cat.
Since then, he hasn’t put a foot wrong.
Five clean sheets in five matches is an impeccable record by any metric, and his stats only serve to reinforce how good he has been.
So far this term, the 32-year-old has made a higher percentage of reflex saves than McGregor did last season, as well making 1.53 more exits per game, and having a long pass completion rate that is 14.6% better than the veteran’s, as per Wyscout.
Gerrard himself has already admitted that the dilemma of whether to start McLaughlin or McGregor from this point onwards his giving him a “headache“, but there are certainly worse problems for a manager to have.
In other Rangers news, McAvennie backs Gers to avoid Europa League catastrophe against Lincoln Red Imps