Van Bronckhorst knows Doekhi inside out as Rangers boss eyes defender – Dutch agent
Dutch football agent Freddy van der Hoorn feels Danilho Doekhi will “thrive” in Scotland if the Vitesse defender joins Rangers.
The Scottish Daily Mail reported via their print edition on Saturday [8 January, page 123] that Giovanni van Bronckhorst wants to sign the 23-year-old centre-back, whose contract at Vitesse expires in the summer.
However, van der Hoorn is unsure about the Gers’ chances of pulling off a deal for Doekhi this month and views it as more likely that a summer swoop will be made when he’s a free agent.
“He has all the ingredients for a good centre half. I’ve seen him a number of times for Vitesse, the under 21s national team as well as with the under 20s and under 18s,” van der Hoorn told Rangers Review.
“He came from Ajax so he’s very comfortable on the ball for being a big lad. He likes to play football from the back, you can trust him at the back.
“He’s quite aggressive and I think he’ll thrive in Scotland. He will need to adapt because it’s a different ball game from playing on the continent in terms of speed and time on the ball. The Eredivisie is a little bit slower.
“Giovanni van Bronckhorst knows him inside and out because he played against his Feyenoord team a couple of times.
“I think he’ll work well with him for sure although I don’t know if the deal will go through in January because Vitesse will not let him go easily.
“On the other hand Rangers are a huge team and a big club. For him, it’s a golden opportunity.”
Doekhi pre-contract a must
The more we read about Doekhi, the more we feel as though he’d be a great addition for Rangers.
Our defence definitely needs to be sorted out at some point this year and James Sands’ arrival from New York City last week does add an option for van Bronckhorst.
However, in the summer, we could see the back-line decimated as both Connor Goldson and Leon Balogun will be out of contract and Nikola Katic could be returning from loan and unwilling to stay. If you’ve checked Katic’s Instagram account lately, he’s deleted everything from it after Sands was handed his squad number.
We doubt Goldson and Balogun will stay on and those two have started more games at centre-back than any other player this season so replacements are needed.
Doekhi is young, van Bronckhorst knows him well and everyone is saying the right things about him.
We’re excited by this one and while we’d rather have him right away, we wouldn’t mind waiting until the summer either.
In other Rangers news, the Gers have made a bid to sign this Premier League forward.