Rangers squad overhaul hint as questions raised over Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s trust in players

Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s lack of substitutions is hinting that a summer of sales and new recruits could be on the way, Kris Boyd believes.

The Rangers manager finished a 1-0 win against St Johnstone with the same side that started the evening in Perth after just one change was made from the weekend draw against Motherwell.

Despite having five chances to change his team during the game at McDiarmid Park, van Bronckhorst didn’t make any – and only used one of his five in Sunday’s 2-2 draw.

The recent lack o change in-play has raised questions over the Ibrox manager’s confidence in his squad according to Boyd and suggests major change is around the corner.

Sky Sports pundit Kris Boyd reckons lack of change in Rangers games suggests major ones will be on the way in the summer. (Photo by Ross MacDonald / SNS Group)

“I don’t know if Giovanni van Bronckhorst trusts his squad to be honest,” Boyd said while summarising on Sky Sports. “When you look at the European games and the effort that Rangers put into the two games against Borussia Dortmund - there weren’t really many changes.

"You look at Borna Barisic who has played a lot of games, he doesn’t find himself in, Leon Balogun comes in and [Calvin] Bassey goes back there. Glen Kamara has been out of the starting line-up, Ryan Jack has come in and Steven Davis - where is he?

“There has not really been a lot of changes from the manager and you get the feeling when you’re maybe looking for the opportunity and it’s not really coming for the Rangers players. Once they’ve got the jersey and if they keep performing there’s a reluctance to change it.

“It maybe tells us there might be an overhaul in the Rangers squad to come in the summer whatever happens - if you do win the league, if you don’t - I think the last few games have told us that I don’t really think van Bronckhorst trusts his squad.”

van Bronckhorst did make a half-time change against Borussia Dortmund to great effect last week though, and said his lack of change in Perth was simply down to being focused on the match, and winning three points.

But Boyd added: “You just get the feeling, when you think of the amount of games Rangers have had recently - there was one substitution at the weekend and there were none tonight - it starts to kind of tell me the story that I don’t think he has the full trust in his squad.”

James McFadden also added his surprise at there being no changes during the win over St Johnstone: “For the amount of games and effort Rangers have had to put in over the last couple of weeks, you’d expect there would be a freshness. Its not to make changes, to say there were bad performances on the pitch it’s just a bit of freshness and different dynamic.”

van Bronckhorst explained to Sky Sports: “Sometimes you change things to turn things around but I didn't feel we needed change. I was so focused on the game to get the win in 90 minutes so I didn't think we needed a change."

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