Hagi returns for Rangers as Philippe Clement makes big call | OneFootball

Ianis Hagi’s Rangers exile finally ended last week as the Romanian’s contract embargo was lifted and Rangers restored the ex-Genk man to first-team training.

Ibrox Noise isn’t overly in favour of the 25-year-old, he lacks pace, and his numbers fall short of Ryan Kent who fans chased from Govan with a borderline cleaver.

For Rangers Hagi has 37 goals and assists in 99 appearances, while Kent had 84 in 218. Kent falls a little short of one in two, while Hagi just gets over one in 3.

In simple terms, Hagi doesn’t even deliver as much as Kent did, and apparently he wasn’t good enough.

But it’s not our decision, and now we contemplate what happens with the attacking midfielder under his new manager.

Clement has been cold about Hagi, he’s never sounded terribly interested in the boy, but the contractual situation has denied him an option in the squad, and with Rangers’ playmakers only being Lawrence and Bajrami (Clement doesn’t seem to like using the Albanian in his natural slot) Hagi now does have a foot in the door.

Hagi has a bit of intelligence in his football, we don’t deny that, and the reason he never really hit the top levels of football was the lack of pace – Hagi has the capacity to unlock intricate defences, but unlike Tom Lawrence he won’t score many because he won’t make the fast runs into the box, and rarely can he score from outside the box.

So you’re probably thinking there’s the answer – he can assist and unlock those defences.

Problem is the assists don’t really shine. Just 21 in 99 Rangers appearances. Very average, and assists are supposed to be a big part of his game.

He has the capacity to do these things, but he doesn’t have the consistency to deliver them regularly.

So quite how Clement will deploy him we’re not sure.

We’re not even sure the manager is that pleased to see him, but nevertheless he will be in the squad now, and time will tell if Hagi can finally deliver some quality that the team is most definitely lacking.