Cremonese striker Cyriel Dessers is ‘keen’ on a move to Ibrox but Rangers will have to up their offer after a first bid of £3 million was rejected by a club recently-relegated from the Italian Serie A.
Not including wages or signing-on fees, Rangers have already brought three new players to the blue side of Glasgow without spending a single penny this summer; Jack Butland, Kieran Dowell and Dujon Sterling joining from Crystal Palace, Norwich City and Chelsea respectively.
And while judgement will be reserved until all three are pulling on royal blue and taking to the Ibrox pitch, it’s difficult to escape the feeling that Rangers have made a quite excellent start to what Mick Beale describes as the club’s ‘biggest’ summer in years.
Butland, Sterling and Dowell add both quality and quantity to the ranks.
Furthermore, their free-agent status frees up funds for Beale to turn his focus to more expensive acquisitions. The Herald reports that deals for Atalanta forward Sam Lammers and Los Angeles FC midfielder Jose Cifuentes could be tied up within the coming week.
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What’s more, Rangers are also very well placed to bring in Cyriel Dessers as part of their post-Alfredo Morelos restructuring up top.
Cyriel Dessers wants Rangers move
Dessers, like Lammers, made his name in the Dutch Eredivisie before moving to Italy. The Nigeria international appears to have little interest in helping Cremonese bounce back after relegation, however, The Herald reporting that he is ‘keen’ on a move to Scotland.
Rangers saw an initial £3 million rejected. According to Calciomercato, there is confidence that a new and improved offer will be given the green light. Rangers are now offering £3.5 million up front, rising to £4.5 million.
Dessers is not the most technically-gifted footballer. Lammers, by contrast, is more stylish and skilful, as emphasised by those Marco van Basten comparisons from his time at Heerenveen. But what Dessers lacks in finesse, he makes up for in finishing.
Dessers won the Eredivisie Golden Boot with mid-table Heracles. He also scored 20 times during the 2021/22 season at Feyenoord; half of those coming en route to the UEFA Conference League final.
Six in 19 Serie A starts, meanwhile, is a respectable return given Cremonese’s struggles at the wrong end of the table. Dessers, who turned down Nottingham Forest in the summer of 2021, even found the net against Scudetto winners Napoli.
‘A good signing for Rangers’
“The guy will want to sign for a club like Rangers. It will be a dream come true for him. He can always give me a phone call if he isn’t sure what to do. I will advise him to sign!,” former Gers hero Marco Negri tells The Herald.
“Dessers is a strong guy. He is really, really physical. He always worked very hard for the team, on both sides of the game; on the offensive side and the defensive side.
“He has areas of his game that he could improve,” Negri adds. “For me, he has to try and increase the number of goals that he scores in a season. He is not an Ally McCoist type player who can score 30 goals a season.
“But he is certainly a fighter, a guy who can bring some energy to a team. He’s physical. He can battle in one-v-one situations, he can hold the ball up, he can make clever runs for his team mates. He can definitely do a job up front.
“(Dessers) can play in a two-man front line or he can play as a lone striker with two players supporting him. You can play high balls up to him because he is strong with his head, you can play it to his feet because he can hold the ball. I think he would be a good signing for Rangers.”