Why Rangers will regret selling £3m star

Glasgow Rangers have made far too many mistakes in the recruitment department in recent seasons, as evidenced by their almost-two year wait for a trophy.

The Light Blues have not lifted silverware since Philippe Clement won the League Cup in 2024 and have not won the Scottish Premiership since Steven Gerrard’s success in the 2020/21 campaign.

Too many players have been sold too soon and gone on to excel elsewhere, whilst too many players have been brought to Ibrox and failed to deliver on the pitch.

Kevin Kelsy and Badredine Bouanani both arrived in Glasgow on deadline day, from Portland Timbers and Stuttgart respectively, and will be hoping to buck the recruitment trend.

What Kelsy and Bouanani will bring to Rangers

The Gers agreed a deal worth around £9m to sign Kelsy from the MLS to bolster Derek McInnes‘ options at the top end of the pitch, and he will be competing with Bojan Miovski, Lawrence Shankland, and Ryan Naderi for a starting berth.

He scored 16 goals in his last 47 appearances in the MLS for Portland Timbers, but Shankland has scored 19 goals in his last 33 games in the Premiership and could be ahead of the Venezuela international in the pecking order in the short-term.

The 22-year-old marksman will need to prove that he can offer more than the Gers captain before emerging as a regular starter to prove his worth at Ibrox.

REUTERS/Peter Lous

Meanwhile, Bouanani also has plenty to prove in Glasgow after he endured a frustrating 2025/26 campaign at Stuttgart, failing to register a single goal or assist in 14 appearances in the Bundesliga.

His form for Nice in Ligue 1 in the 2024/25 season, however, suggests that he does have the potential to offer a threat as a scorer and a creator of goals as a left-footed right winger.

Therefore, both players come in with potential that has yet to be fulfilled and with plenty to prove at Ibrox, which is why both of these deals are risky moves that could go either way.

Why Rangers could regret selling an upgrade on Kelsy and Bouanan

Going back to the earlier point, one of the players sold too soon by the Scottish giants is now an even better player than both Kelsy and Bouanani.

In the summer of 2023, Michael Beale decided to revamp his attack and one of the moves that he made was to sell Fashion Sakala to Al-Fayha in the Saudi Pro League for a fee of around £3m.

That sale represented good business on paper by the Scottish giants because he had only joined the club two years prior on a free transfer from Oostende, meaning that they made significant profit on him.

However, it also meant that the Gers lost a big threat at the top end of the pitch, as the Zambian whiz had scored 24 goals and provided 15 assists in 91 matches for the club.

Sakala was a versatile talent who could operate on the right wing, where Bouanani plays, or as a centre-forward, where Kelsy plays, and was effective in both roles.

Now, his form for Al-Fahya in the three years since his exit from Ibrox suggests that Beale made a huge mistake when he opted to cash in on the Zambia international in 2023.

Rangers have just paid a fee of £9m to sign a striker who has yet to reach double figures for goals in a league campaign in his career, in Kelsy, whilst Sakala scored 13 goals in 29 Pro League games last term.

The ex-Gers striker also scored 19 goals in 32 Pro League matches in the 2023/24 campaign and has scored 43 goals in 110 appearances in all competitions for Al-Fayha.

Sakala, therefore, looks like an even more effective goalscorer than Kelsy because he has consistently shown that he can score goals at an impressive rate, which is something that the Venezuela international has yet to do.

On top of that, the versatile star, who can also play as a right winger, created more ‘big chances’ in the Pro League last term than Bouanani has ever created in a single season.

The Algerian winger has never created more than eight ‘big chances’ in a single season, whilst Sakala has hit double figures for ‘big chances’ created in each of the last two seasons in Saudi Arabia.

There is a lesson to be learned from here for the Gers because they should place more value on players who can deliver consistently in the final third in the here and now, rather than overloading their squad on prospects with plenty to prove.