Ianis Hagi is gearing up for a return to Rangers after his Euro 2024 exploits with Romania.
The 25-year-old is still very much a Rangers player after spending last season on loan with Alavés in La Liga.
After Romania’s Euro 2024 exit Hagi is a step closer to that Rangers return but it is fair to say the ex-Genk playmaker’s future is up in the air.
With it all to prove to new manager Philippe Clement, earlier in the summer Hagi revealed his agents were instructed to assess his options ahead of the new campaign.
But now one Romanian football manager has taken aim at Ianis Hagi in a stinging post-Germany tirade which brings into question the midfielder’s on-pitch application.
Hagi ‘not a great effort player’
Ianis Hagi is a huge figure in Romanian football.
Whilst the Rangers star has made an impact on the game in his own right, that’s mostly because of his famous father.
Gheorghe Hagi is one of the greatest players of his generation and is considered the most influential footballer in the history of the beautiful game in Romania.
Hagi Snr remains a figure of huge influence in the country.
It’s a double-edged sword for Ianis, who has both benefitted and been disadvantaged by the weight of the famous name on the back of his shirt.
Whether the analysis is good or bad, it has undoubtedly shone a spotlight on Ianis Hagi and Romanian punditry can be ruthless.
After the nation’s humbling Euro 2024 exit to the hands of the Netherlands, Romanian manager Răzvan Lucescu has been speaking his mind about the Rangers midfielder.
Slaughtering the Romanian international, the PAOK manager has questioned both Hagi’s commitment to the cause and his leadership credentials.
“He’s not a great effort player,” insists Lucescu, as quoted by GSP. “He is a player who needs to know that the others are well positioned, that they cover him when he makes a mistake, to have this calmness and freedom to make mistakes in order to enhance his quality, the vision of the game in the first place.”
Later Lucescu added: “I don’t know if he is a leader! Leaders are born, they are educated. It must have something.
“I don’t know him as a person, I know that he is a very serious player, with great ambition and determination.”
Rangers have seen leadership qualities
It’s quite a scathing attack on Ianis Hagi from Răzvan Lucescu.
The Rangers midfielder is two years on from a very serious cruciate ligament injury and in many respects is probably lucky to just be playing the game.
But whilst there can be no arguments that Hagi’s development has been severely hindered, there’s been some big moments in a Rangers shirt which will have Ibrox fans backing their midfielder against the comments.
The stunning double v Braga springs to mind, whilst in the 55-winning season there were a number of 1-0 wins with Hagi as the goalscorer.
We don’t know if Ianis is going to be around next season but at least we know he won’t be heading to Greece with PAOK.
The same cannot be said for one of his Ibrox teammates.
Cyriel Dessers has been strongly linked with a move to PAOK and a potential link-up with Lucescu in Greece.
