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Landing £20m-plus for Bassey is the first of many ways Rangers MUST capitalise on Seville

Gary Keown

FOR all the talk about Joe Aribo, Ryan Kent and Alfredo Morelos in recent seasons, it turns out Calvin Bassey is the real asset with the potential to kickstart the ‘trading model’ Rangers have so often spoken about yet never really actioned.

Selling him might be hard for supporters to digest, but it might also be one of many things necessary if the Ibrox club are to take advantage of the unique platform provided by the Europa League final and really transition into a grown-up, forward-facing, profit-making, future-proofed club.

There is no need to carry on with the superlatives over Bassey’s display in Seville. We all saw how he stood tall while the more experienced shrunk with the weight of the occasion upon them, his performance against Eintracht taking the remarkable progress made under Giovanni van Bronckhorst to a new level again.

That English clubs are hovering is no shock. And nothing to fear. The two years left on Bassey’s existing contract put Rangers in a strong bargaining position. Indeed, this might well be the moment where the board and sporting director Ross Wilson have to show they can strike the balance between holding out for the right price and not ending up in the situation they found themselves in when turning down £16million from Lille for Morelos two years ago.

Rangers did well landing £12m — potentially rising to £16m — from Everton for the unproven Nathan Patterson. Now, they need a really big fee to hammer home to richer clubs from bigger leagues that they have a proper grip on selling while talent is hot and doing business on the keenest of terms.

Management of playing assets certainly hasn’t been their strong point so far. Connor Goldson looks set to walk under freedom of contract. Meanwhile, Aribo, Kent and Morelos are all about to enter the final year of their current deals with their values compromised.

That cannot continue if buying and selling players is to be a key element of the business model. And that’s why cashing in on Bassey (right) when his stock is deservedly high may be unavoidable.

That the 22-year-old defender made UEFA’s Europa League team of the tournament will not have been missed. It should also make him worth £20m-plus for Premier League clubs looking for homegrown players. Maybe the fact Kent made it into that XI as well — along with captain James Tavernier — will offer a little extra leverage to try and secure a decent profit on the £7.5m paid to Liverpool for his services.

Rangers need to start selling and sending out the right message. Yet, this is about more than just perfecting the complex and challenging business of doing deals at the right price at the right time with adequate replacements — preferably academy prospects such as Alex Lowry rather than illogical nonsense signings of the ilk of Aaron Ramsey and Amad Diallo — waiting in the wings.

As pointed out previously in this column, the landscape of European football is constantly changing. The concept of a breakaway league from UEFA isn’t going away. Rangers and Celtic would have a lot to offer any new set-up, particularly if previouslydiscussed plans of two divisions of 20 clubs ever crystallise, but there will be fierce competition. And that’s why they must concentrate on showing the very best version of themselves. In every regard.

Certainly, the run to the final of the Europa League was a wonderful showcase that Rangers must form solid plans to build upon.

The atmospheres inside Ibrox for those home games against Dortmund, Braga and RB Leipzig were thunderous and pure. Something everyone and anyone would happily take their kids along to.

Proper football songs, no rubbish from the ‘banned list’ and such incredible, addictive theatre for those both in the ground and watching from home.

The fact the final turned into a fiesta in Seville — with no arrests despite an estimated 100,000 pouring in there to find themselves subject to some appalling treatment and conditions — then showed absolutely what a modern Rangers really could be.

That experience should be the blueprint for the culture going forward in domestic games too. Put simply, Rangers have a big, broad support that should no longer be defined or led by the lowest common denominator.

Certainly, that’s a sector of the support the board have played to for quite some time now. And that has to stop, too.

There was too much talk this time last year, after ‘55’ and all that, about settling scores in the wake of what happened when the club went into meltdown in 2012. There have since been unsightly issues with broadcasters, the SPFL and the league’s main sponsor cinch.

It plays well to the gallery, but what Rangers should be concentrating on most is winning allies within Scottish football and changing it from a position of internal political power.

Shouting from the fringes about the SPFL not being fit for purpose is one thing, but what have they offered to effect meaningful change?

There are some encouraging signs that certain people inside the club can see the need for a new direction. In Seville, for example, there were small moves made behind the scenes towards re-establishing some kind of relationship with the wider media.

The club’s stance on that over the course of the season has just been stupid, really.

And self-defeating.

Charging up to

£25,000 for access and refusing to let reporters ask questions of the manager and players simply aren’t the actions of a big club.

Big clubs understand that a multi-pronged media strategy is the way to build a brand. They understand that the players, the public faces, sell the product and need wide exposure. Rangers have no shortage of strong, likeable personalities in their dressing room, guys the public can identify with.

Tavernier represents well. Goldson is a great talker and has been a big presence. Bassey is a crackling ball of energy and positivity. John Lundstram, by all accounts, is a really good guy. Fashion Sakala has a smile — and a story — that could light up Ibrox on its own.

Yet, they’ve been hidden away, restricted to questions posed by podcasters and one or two professional broadcasters in stilted, restrictive Zoom calls. Showing almost nothing of themselves.

You may think that isn’t important. That these are the predictable grumbles of a journalist. Yet, you just have to look across the city of Glasgow to see how it works.

Ange Postecoglou had a rough start to his time as manager at Celtic, but he was allowed to let his personality breathe, to win people round, to explain his ideas at length, to show people who he really is.

The rest, as they say, is history. Sure, Rangers got an invitation to serve as one of the support acts on his Homecoming Super Series in Sydney in November.

That shambles, which ended with them withdrawing from the planned ‘friendly’ with Celtic in the wake of ferocious protests from their own supporters, was a badly needed line in the sand. It showed their fans weren’t willing to be taken for granted any longer.

That is something Rangers need to be mindful of going forward, too. Vice-chairman John Bennett talked outside the team hotel in Seville on the morning after the night before about how the fans had ‘carried the club on their backs’ for 10 years.

Why, then, did they have so much garbage to put up with in the preceding months? A ticketing shambles for the Champions League qualifier with Malmo, 4,636 extortionate new strips stuck on the market, an unpopular ticketing programme called MyGers, little info on why the new Edmiston House remains a building site and, of course, the Sydney Super Cup.

It was the club’s 150th birthday this year. Until Seville, the best thing about the ‘celebrations’ were a tifo at the Aberdeen home game paid for by punters.

That can’t go on. That pilgrimage to Andalusia showed what Rangers can be with their fanbase rallying round. Their supporters have shown themselves capable, if they try, of changing ingrained attitudes, looking outwards instead of inwards and winning friends and influencing people with their actions.

It is time the board did the same.

Football

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2022-05-22T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-05-22T07:00:00.0000000Z

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