It’s clear that when an Old Firm side lose arguably their best defender, they will hunt down a replacement fairly immediately. This appears to be the case after Rangers were left with no alternative but to sell Carlos Cuellar to Aston Villa for £7.8 million, with Walter Smith identifying a certain Championship defender as his replacement.
Wales Online reports that Cardiff’s Glenn Loovens is the Scottish giant’s number one target, with an initial bid of around £2.5 million expected to be tabled. Quite whether this will be enough to wrest him from the grasp of Peter Ridsdale is another matter, although City are wary of the fact that they’ll lose the Dutchman for nowt when he’s out of contract at the end of the summer.
It will take straight cash for Rangers to land the Dutch defender and City chairman Peter Ridsdale insists the Bluebirds value Loovens at £3m-plus.
Loovens is still refusing to sign the new three-year contract offered by the Bluebirds and, if he maintains that stance, which he insists he will, then he could walk away for nothing at the end of this season.
City have offered to insert a get-out clause in any new deal, as they did with Michael Chopra and Aaron Ramsey in the past, but Loovens wants to keep his options open.
Cardiff fans, would the player’s departure be a massive blow to any promotion hopes this season? Or do you think that around £3 million could be used productively – after all, the club only paid £250,000 for him two seasons ago, so it would represent some great business.