Rangers likely to be ‘blocked’ by Neil Lennon in pursuit of Kosovo striker | OneFootball

Rangers can expect no favours whatsoever in their reported pursuit of Albion Rrahmani after former Celtic cult hero Neil Lennon was confirmed manager of his club, Rapid Bucharest.

Ibrox Noise confirmed the price for the striker was said to be in the £10M region after Benfica and Aston Villa both showed significant interest in his services, well, if Rangers were to have any significant chance of signing him those opportunities probably just went out the window with Lennon taking over at his employer.

Bucharest, 6th in Romania, are some way of winning the title and hope bringing former SPL champion as player and manager Lennon will tip their fortunes in a direction of a trophy or two, but his arrival there probably spells the end for any real Rangers hopes of securing the Kosovo striker.

Of course, for Lennon, his priorities now are Rapid, and getting the best deal for them – if Benfica and Villa are willing to spend upwards of £10M on Rrahmani, it prices Rangers out and that will suit him just fine.

We’ve been in a similar scenario before, with Belgium’s Nicolas Raskin who Rangers wanted so eagerly some time ago – his club, Standard Liege, their manager was of course ex-Celtic boss Ronny Deila who ended up causing a huge issue for the player, who himself didn’t behave terribly well either.

He ended up exiled into the reserves at the Jupiler Pro giants.

Was that related to his dislike of Rangers? Or was it a clash of egos with the player? Who knows.

What we do know is Lennon loathes Rangers, Celtic are his team 100% and he would rather sell to anyone but us.

But his priorities now are his new Romanian employer, and if he must sell his best striker, he will, but he will make it beyond tough for Rangers if Philippe Clement and his team are serious about the striker.

It’s probably a non-starter now.