Exclusive:"I don't see": Ex-Rangers cult hero names key problem at Ibrox and says only one player hitting club's standards
The former Rangers favourite says there’s only one player showing Ibrox standards.
Rangers need an overhaul of their recruitment system if they are to return to the summit of the Scottish Premiership, according to former Ibrox cult hero Nacho Novo.
The club’s new American owners opted to sack head coach Russell Martin after the 1-1 draw with Falkirk at the weekend left them with just one league win from their opening seven games, with the 39-year-old departing Govan after just 123 days after his appointment in the summer.
With the club now searching for their fourth permanent manager in just over three years, former Rangers forward Novo believes the club needs to look within itself in order to find the remedy for their current woes. The 46-year-old feels Rangers are missing key ingredients from their starting XI and has called on the club’s owners to reconsider how they recruit in the forthcoming transfer windows.
“They’re missing leaders,” said Novo. “When I played, we used to have Barry Ferguson and Fernando Ricksen as the captains. It’s not just about being the captain, though; we had seven or eight guys who wanted to win, all on the same pitch. In this current team, I don’t see one. [Nico] Raskin, maybe?
“You need to have a winning mentality [at Rangers]. All the time. You go 1-0 down, you just keep going. Keep winning. That’s all it's about. Be strong and always positive, don’t put yourself down if the fans are going at you. When we used to play, did the fans never boo? No. But it is how you react. Are you going to hide, or are you going to say ‘boo me, I’ll show you’? It’s just responsibility, I was lucky to play with this level of player, who had mentality, hard work. That will eventually make you a success.”
Novo, who scored 71 goals in 255 appearances for the Light Blues during the years of 2004 and 2010, admits the next manager needs help when it comes to signing players, calling on the hierarchy to reshape their current model, with the Spanish forward admitting he believes a club such as Rangers requires a different type of recruitment in order to bring in the correct mentality to Ibrox.
“I don’t see any leaders there, and that is one of the biggest problems,” Novo told Gambling.com, who specialise in sports betting and casino reviews and recommendations. “We’ve not got that at all. For me, that’s a typical situation; the scouting at Rangers is also not great. It’s so easy to say, but why not take on Arthur Numan for it [scouting] in the Netherlands, [Lorenzo] Amoruso in Italy, and me in Spain. See what type of players are there, because we know how to win leagues, what mentality players need to come and play for the club.
“We’ve been there, we see it. Get Pedro Mendes involved. So many professionals who know the game, why won’t we use them? You can have statistics; it can help. But that doesn’t tell me anything. I need to go and watch those players, five or six games, and see the person. Everyone has changed these days; it is unfair, but it is what it is.”
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