Andy Halliday backs new Rangers signing as he makes £42m Manchester United point

There are always questions whenever a club, like Philippe Clement’s Rangers did recently, bring in a player who could not buy a game at his previous employers.

In stark contrast to the likes of Connor Barron, Robin Propper and Nedim Bajrami – fixtures in the starting XIs at Aberdeen, FC Twente and Sassuolo respectively – Rafael Fernandes arrives at Rangers a year since his most recent league appearance.

In fact, Tuesday was the one-year anniversary of Fernandes’ last outing. A 5-0 victory for Arouca over Vizela in the Portuguese top flight in January 2024.

Since then, the 6ft 3ins centre-half secured a £2.5 million move to France before ending up in Glasgow, via a grand total of zero Ligue 1 appearances in the red shirt of LOSC Lille.

The question being asked by the more glass-half-empty members of the Rangers fanbase, then, is why exactly Rafael Fernandes failed to force his way into the first-team picture at Lille?

Well, former Rangers midfielder Andy Halliday is viewing things from a different, more glass-half-full perspective. He argues that, during Fernandes’ first few months at the Stade Pierre Mauroy, Leny Yoro was starting week-in, week-out while establishing himself as arguably the best young defensive talent in European football.

Andy Halliday backs Rangers loanee Rafael Fernandes

Yoro found himself in the midst of a transfer tug of war that following summer, Manchester United eventually outmuscling Real Madrid while paying an initial £42 million for the rangy Frenchman.

And while Fernandes remained out on the outside looking in following Yoro’s departure to Old Trafford, that owes much to the form of Bafode Diakite in that right-sided central defensive berth.

Though Halliday is disappointed by the number of Rangers signings this winter – Fernandes the only and only new face at Ibrox – he has few concerns about the identity of that new signing.

“Rangers have made one signing. I cannot believe it,” Halliday begins. “[ Yoro, who Man United have signed for 50 million [euros].