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Rangers hold the cards in new Sunday talks on Nicolas Raskin to dramatically reduce fee
Rangers are set for a new round of talks with Standard Liege to bring down Nicolas Raskin’s €5.5million asking price, The 4th Official reports.
The young Belgian only has a year left on his contract and the Gers are therefore “unwilling” to do business at this amount and are expecting any deal to be done for a “far lower” fee.
The reliable online source T4O follows up on their original exclusive on the 21-year-old in a new post on Patreon, confirming that the player wants to move to Ibrox and talks have already taken place with him.
His current manager, the former Celtic boss Ronny Deila, has admitted it will be difficult to keep Raskin past the end of the window but the “main challenge” is reportedly going to be negotiations between the two clubs.
T4O reports that there are more of those due to happen on Sunday 28 August, and they point out that the Belgian club “doesn’t have a winning hand” as they attempt to force the higher fee in the circumstances.
Raskin has already played five times in midfield for Standard so far this season.
Advantage
All the ingredients look to be present for this one to get done on terms agreeable to Ross Wilson and company.
If Rangers want him and the player wants to come that’s half the battle won, and the fact that this is likely one of the Belgian side’s last opportunities to receive any transfer fee for the under-21 international should help.
The fact is that Giovanni van Bronckhorst isn’t in desperate need of a new midfielder immediately, although he may like one and were Glen Kamara to leave that could change.
So it should give the club the ability to walk away now and wait to sort a pre-contract agreement in January since Raskin is young and already appears to be pretty set on Glasgow.
With James Sands now looking fairly set at centre-back, his escape from a red card against Ross County on Saturday notwithstanding, there is potentially space for a new man to enter the squad in the middle of the park.
Kamara leaving would be surprising but would definitely increase the need, while Steven Davis is 37 and will presumably not be around a huge amount longer, so Raskin may be the answer.
In other Rangers news, another member of the Gers squad who was left out against Ross County is wanted on the continent before the window closes.