Is Joe Rothwell The Celtic Killing Signing Rangers Need? | OneFootball

So, Joe Rothwell is now officially confirmed by Rangers as the club’s second summer signing in terms of fresh signings, third if we include Cameron as well. The reaction to Rothwell is generally modestly positive, without being necessarily overwhelming and there’s not too many detractors, apart of course from yours truly here at Ibrox Noise.

We are not exactly blown away by this signing. We keep hearing the echo of former Norwich man Kieran Dowell, who was bigged up by Canaries much in the same way that Rothwell is being. Dowell, like Rothwell, had around 20–30 Premier League appearances and around 200 Championship appearances, give or take, and that one didn’t exactly shine when we were initially in for him in the first place, never mind his actual performances on the pitch.

We’re not saying that Rothwell is a failure, what we are saying is his CV is hardly breathtaking. A number of Rangers fans have pointed out his impressive performances on the ball for Leeds United, for whom he was on loan last season. They talked about his composure, his passing and his reading of the game to an extent. The problem that Ibrox Noise always has with these kind of signings is the beast that is Rangers is a totally different animal to Leeds United. If Leeds United were the top side in the English Premier League, then yes, players like these would know the pressure and the demands of Rangers. But at Leeds, they finished first. In the Championship. But nevertheless, we can’t be overwhelmed by Rothwell as a timbre or calibre of additional signing. We want to like all of our signings, we want to have a lot of hope over these guys coming in.

But you can’t be overwhelmed when it’s a loan signing from Bournemouth, another Bournemouth player who’s been loaned, that’s Rothwell, and a Dundee kid. This isn’t exactly Celtic killing material and this window, it doesn’t look like we’re going to get Celtic killing material.

We’re going to basically get players at the level that we were already at. There’s going to be nothing new coming in that is going to take us up a level. There is a notion about Max Aarons because he’s an experienced Premier League player with 100 appearances. But he’s also fallen on hard times, and we’ve seen much better players than that fail under the demands of Rangers.

The fact is, Rangers is a tough, tough team to play for. The demands are sky high, drawing is like a defeat, and even winning with an average performance is barely praised either.

The fact is, these players come here and they struggle with the expectation, with the demand. Because as we say, the demands at Leeds, and indeed at Bournemouth, are completely different to what you’ll get at Ibrox. These guys don’t know what on earth they are in for. And fans are using their CV to defend them, which we suppose is fair enough.

But we do harp back to Barry Ferguson, who once offered an anecdote about a pre-season friendly where it was 1–1 at half-time and the fans were losing it over this. The new signings who were part of the match in question were bewildered in the dressing room.

They were asking why the fans are reacting like this when it’s only a pre-season friendly and it’s 1–1. Barry looked them in the eye and said what he then expressed in general in this column at the time, which was, this is Rangers lads, you’ve never seen anything like it before and you never will again.

And that is so very, very true. And the beast that is Rangers is mega demanding. Only a few are capable of coping with it. Only a few are capable of coping with it. And unfortunately, very few in the last 13 years have been of that calibre. That’s the reality. Will Rothwell be different? We suppose time will tell. But as with this entire current regime that we’re going through, Ibrox Noise isn’t particularly convinced by any of it.