Glasgow Rangers head coach Philippe Clement is under pressure once again after his side were held to a 1-1 draw by Dundee United at Ibrox on Saturday.
Ahead of the game, Football Insider reported that the Belgian boss, whose team are 11 points adrift of first in the Scottish Premiership, was one game away from being sacked by the club.
It remains to be seen if the board will decide to part company with the former AS Monaco head coach, but they are still looking for a manager who can overcome Celtic to win the title, as they have been since Steven Gerrard left the club in 2021.
Even Gerrard did not get everything right at Ibrox, though, and one of his signings that did not quite work out was central midfielder Lassana Coulibaly, who was initially tipped for big things.
Rangers’ very own N’Golo Kante
Ahead of the 2018/19 campaign, Rangers swooped to sign the Mali international on a season-long loan from Ligue 1 side Angers and by October of that season he was being compared to N’Golo Kante.
The Scottish Sun described him as a fan-favourite, because of his ‘powerhouse’ nature in midfield, and claimed that Ibrox fans had been comparing him to the Chelsea sensation.
Being compared to Kante, who played 269 games for Chelsea and won the Champions League, as well as the World Cup for France, illustrated how impressive he was at the start of his Rangers career.
Coulibaly, who acknowledged the comparison to Kante and vowed to work hard to live up to it, started all six of the club’s Europa League matches and started 13 times in the Premiership before the turn of the year.
Gerrard described him as a “machine” and claimed that there was more to come from the central midfielder, but he ultimately failed to kick on.
First Impressions
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How it turned out for Lassana Coulibaly
When Rangers returned to action after the winter break, Coulibaly did not hit the same heights as Gerrard stopped using him in matches in the league, due to a dip in form on the pitch and the arrival of Glen Kamara from Dundee in January.
In the second half of the season, the Mali international was an unused substitute on eight occasions, failed to make the matchday squad five times, and made just four appearances in the Premiership – starting once.
He was also an unused substitute in four of the club’s five matches in the Scottish FA Cup in 2019, which shows that the manager did not trust him to play or start matches regularly for the Light Blues.
Meanwhile, Kamara, who arrived in January, came in and started 12 of his 13 appearances in the Premiership during the second half of the season for Rangers, as he came in and started over Coulibaly in the middle of the park.
The Finland international’s move to the club played a part in the Angers loanee’s downfall and meant that the club did not move to bring him back for a second spell, as he returned to the Ligue 1 side in the summer of 2019.
Coulibaly now plays in the Serie A for Lecce, after a spell with Torino, whilst Kamara played 193 times for Rangers before his move to Leeds United in 2023.
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