Barry Ferguson ‘genuinely desperate’ on Cyriel Dessers after Rangers January exit talks shunned
Barry Ferguson is delighted by the way Cyriel Dessers’ has not backed away from the challenge after a difficult start to life at Rangers by staying at the club this month.
The former Ibrox captain wrote in his Daily Record column on 26 January that he is “genuinely desperate” to see the striker make a success of things at the club, and suggests he has shown the mindset to do so in overcoming criticism to score double-figures so far.
Following the 29-year-old’s strike off the bench against Hibs in midweek Ferguson says he “jumped up off my sofa” in celebration, and is impressed that the Nigerian international didn’t take the same route out during the January transfer window as proved to be the best option for fellow summer signing Sam Lammers.
He said: “After some of the stick he’s had to endure over the first few months of the season it might have been easier for him to skulk away and think about playing his football somewhere else to give himself a bit of an easier ride.
“When Clement came in he could have asked the new manager for a quiet word and asked to be allowed to leave on loan.
“But while that turned out to the best solution for Sam Lammers – who had a similarly difficult start to his Rangers career – Dessers simply doesn’t look like a man who is prepared to give this club up just so easily…
“Yes, he’ll be looking at Lammers leaving the club to go back to Holland on loan and he’ll have seen Fabio Silva come in from Wolves with an eye on his position leading the line.
“But when he got the chance to come off the bench he grabbed it with both hands and scored a goal which we’d all be raving about had anyone else in the country come up with a finish as cool as that.
“Honestly, I jumped up off my sofa when he tucked it away because – like so many other Rangers fans – I’m genuinely desperate to see him turn things around.”
Battle
It would be hard to argue that Dessers has been a roaring success at Ibrox so far since for £4.5million [Football Scotland, 30 June] Rangers would have been expecting a lot more.
But where the others who have struggled since they came in have either gone already in the case of Lammers, or hardly been seen in the case of Jose Cifuentes, the striker certainly appears to have the attitude to make something of himself in the SPFL.
His scoring record isn’t actually that bad on paper, but the so-called eye test has shown that it could and probably should be significantly better at this stage.
Dessers does appear to be growing in confidence, which may have been aided by Lammers’ departure and injuries leaving him with little competition for places outside of loanee Fabio Silva.
If he can start putting away some more chances, and crucially doing so in the biggest games, then there is scope yet for Michael Beale’s decision to spend heavily on him instead of someone like Lawrence Shankland might to end up not looking quite so misguided.
In light of the injury nightmares Kemar Roofe and Danilo have had it is unlikely that Philippe Clement would have let both Dessers and Lammers leave if both had tried, but given a choice between keeping one or the other the right one has surely stayed.
In other Rangers news, a first-team Light Blues ace has rejected a transfer offer to leave before the deadline.
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