It feels pretty inevitable already that, at some point in the very near future, Hamza Igamane will be offered the chance to leave Rangers.
Premier League trio Tottenham Hotspur, Aston Villa and Newcastle United have been linked already with Rangers’ exciting £1.7 million centre-forward.
But a word of warning; Other strikers to depart Ibrox in the recent past have learned the hard way that the grass is not always greener elsewhere.
Of course, Hamza Igamane is far more gifted and boasting far greater potential than many of his Rangers predecessors. Yet, the fact remains that Alfredo Morelos has found life a struggle back in South America. Antonio Colak has scored only four goals in Italy since leaving Glasgow back in the summer of 2023.
Florian Kamberi, however, makes Colak look positively prolific when glancing through his very unflattering post-Rangers CV.
Florian Kamberi made a big mistake turning down Rangers
According to the Scottish Sun, Kamberi rejected the chance to join Steven Gerrard’s Rangers on a permanent basis back in 2020 after his spell on loan from Premiership rivals Hibernian was cut short due to the COVID pandemic.
If Kamberi could turn back the clock half a decade, knowing what he knows now, a Swiss centre-forward with more stamps on his passport than Michael Palin would surely make a different decision when presented with a two-year deal at Ibrox.
Because, in the five years that have passed since then, Kamberi has represented no fewer than seven different clubs in five different countries. Even more remarkably, his seven-nation journey has seen him score just seven league goals in the colours of St Gallen, Aberdeen, Sheffield Wednesday, Huddersfield Town, Slaven Belupo and most recently Romanian outfit FC Politehnica Iasi.
Across all competitions, his tally of goals since 2020 stands at just ten in 91 appearances combined for that motley crew of far-flung institutions.
Emil Sandoi, the coach of Politehnica Iasi, insists that the decision to cut short his stay in Romania late last year was one made by the player rather than the club. Yet, with only two goals in 16 appearances for a club sitting 15th in a 16-team division, it’s not as if Kamberi’s departure will have too much of an impact on their hopes of avoiding the drop.
“I’m sorry that Kamberi left,” Sandoi said. “He is a player who could have helped the team a lot. He wanted to leave, although the club wanted to keep him.”
Two months on, and with his 30th birthday just over a week away, Florian Kamberi is still awaiting his latest new beginning.
Barry Ferguson thinks offers will soon arrive for Hamza Igamane
Now, there is no reason to believe that the same miserable fate is destined to befall Hamza Igamane when the time comes for him to graduate from the Premiership finishing school. But with interim manager Barry Ferguson already having admitted that he expects offers to arrive over the summer, the Rangers boss could do worse than to use Kamberi, Colak and Morelos as cautionary tales and a reason to stay put.
“For the time being, it’s a case of enjoying him for as long as he’s still at the club because he may not be around for all that long,” Ferguson told the Daily Record in January.
“In an ideal world, Igamane is the kind of player you build a team around for years and years to come. But there has to be a sense of realism where the club’s current position is concerned. Rangers are a selling club and, like it or not, that means they may soon be made an offer which they can’t possibly turn down.
“It’s important to remain realistic. And the realist inside me expects some big bids to start arriving over the coming summer.”
