Glasgow Rangers manager Philippe Clement has shown that he is looking to establish a player trading model at the Ibrox side which could allow them to gain maximum profit for players that they sign cheaply and below market value.
The likes of Mohamed Diomande and Oscar Cortes are two signings who could emerge into wonderful players during their spell in Glasgow and this will allow Clement to move them on further down the line for a fee far greater than what he initially paid.
The Light Blues have made a profit on Nathan Patterson, Joe Aribo, and club record sale Calvin Bassey since January 2022, but these three have been the only ones since the club returned to the Premiership in 2016.
It wasn’t always like this, as at the turn of the century, Rangers were selling players regularly and one player went on to rake in the club a staggering £8m when he was sold to Newcastle United in 2005 – Jean-Alain Boumsong.
How much Rangers signed Jean-Alain Boumsong for
After securing a sublime treble during the 2002/03 campaign, Alex McLeish was under pressure to deliver further success, yet financial constraints at the club meant he had to sell off some key assets.
Out went Neil McCann, Lorenzo Amoruso and Barry Ferguson, to be replaced by Nuno Capucho, Emerson and Henning Beg, ageing players who were all clearly nearing retirement rather than being at their peak.
This turn of events led to the club enduring a horrific season. Not only did they finish 17 points adrift of Celtic in second, but the Gers failed to lift a trophy, and it meant McLeish was facing considerable pressure from both the board and the supporters to get things right ahead of the following campaign.
He did manage to secure the services of Dado Prso – a Champions League finalist – on a pre-contract agreement, while the biggest signing looked like it was going to be that of Boumsong, who had also signed a pre-contract with the Gers in December 2003.
They had fought off interest from Liverpool, Arsenal, and Inter Milan to secure the highly rated defender, and it would soon prove to be a lucrative decision…
Jean-Alain Boumsong shone for Rangers
The Frenchman must have found playing against the likes of Livingston, Inverness Caledonian Thistle, and Dundee a culture shock considering he had faced off against Paris-Saint Germain and AS Monaco just months prior, yet he adapted well to Scottish football.
During the first half of the season, Boumsong featured 28 times for the Light Blues as they improved massively from the previous season. McLeish’s side were challenging for the title, and they had even secured two Old Firm wins during November to really ramp up the pressure on Celtic.
During this time, the centre-back was still a regular in the France national team, proving just how big a coup it was to bring him to Scotland and his performances did not go unnoticed.
How much Rangers sold Jean-Alain Boumsong for
The supporters knew that keeping a player like Boumsong at Ibrox for the long term was never going to be an option. Getting a couple of years out of him before selling for a profit was looked upon as the best-case scenario.
When Newcastle offered £8m during the January transfer window in 2005, McLeish was never at liberty of turning it down, especially with the growing financial problems rearing their head at Ibrox.
Graeme Souness – a legend among the Rangers faithful – lavished praise on the Frenchman.
"He is a young man who has a great desire to be the best,” the former Liverpool legend said. “He is a communicator on the pitch. You can never have enough of them. It is something we have been lacking; we don't have enough people who are talkers.
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"The supporters will enjoy watching him play. He is potentially a top man in our football team. I think he expects to be up there with the likes of [John] Terry and [Rio] Ferdinand.”
Judging by his displays on the continent for Auxerre and in Scotland for the Light Blues, Souness looked as though he had secured a player who could become a key part of his Newcastle side for the next few years.
Little did everyone know, but the Gers clearly got the best deal as they hit the jackpot by selling Boumsong for £8m.
Jean-Alain Boumsong’s career statistics
The 6 foot 3 colossus failed to live up to his lavish transfer fee, going on to make a total of just 59 appearances for the Magpies, spending just 18 months in the north-east of England before joining Juventus in 2006.
The Old Lady had been relegated to Serie B due to their involvement in the infamous Calciopoli scandal in 2006 and Boumsong spent just one full season in Italy before moving back to France, joining Lyon in 2007.
85 appearances for the French side saw him pick up a Ligue 1 winners medal, and he eventually finished his career in Greece, playing 75 times for Panathinaikos before retiring in 2013.
It was evident that the former Auxerre defender was a standout during his spell in Scotland, and he was not going to last long north of the border.
It turned out he couldn’t quite replicate these displays in the English top flight, however, and he was even voted as the 17th worst player to ever feature in the Premier League, a remarkable feat considering how well he had done in Glasgow.
Boumsong still ranks as the fifth-highest sale in the club’s history, ranking only behind Bassey, Patterson, Giovanni van Bronckhorst and Alan Hutton, showing how big a fee it actually was, especially since it has nearly been 20 years.
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While the Ibrox side simply cannot attract players like this anymore, Clement should be targeting promising youngsters who have the capacity to develop into sellable assets, and then rinse and repeat this in order to generate funds for future transfers.
Hopefully, the summer transfer window can see the club move on a few players for big transfer fees and, in turn, this can be used to sign future superstars.