BREAKING NEWS:£3.9 million wasted: The “disastrous” Caixinha agreement left Rangers with nothing for 84 weeks, according to some.

Glasgow Rangers have a great opportunity to add the Scottish Cup and Premiership trophies to their League Cup victory from earlier in the season.

In just four months, Philippe Clement has turned the Ibrox team from also-rans to league leaders, managing an eight-point surge at the top of the standings.

In addition, the Gers have played really well and created many of chances during games, but they don’t have a true striker to convert those opportunities.

Dare I say it, but Rangers seem to be gaining momentum in their pursuit of the league crown. If Clement can continue to put up performances like these in the upcoming weeks, the next few months might be quite remarkable.

The Light Blues signed Mohamed Diomande, Oscar Cortes, and Fabio Silva last month thanks to his astute maneuvering in the transfer market, and all three appear capable of making significant contributions in the months to come.

Could this be the start of Rangers reclaiming the throne in Scottish football? Early signs point to a strong possibility, which demonstrates the club’s progress since 2016.

Rangers overspent on a large number of acquisitions.

The Gers had to go through the management of Mark Warburton, Graham Murty, and Pedro Caixinha before signing Steven Gerrard in May 2018, and it was the latter who may have caused the team to regress years.

Rangers had three different managers during their disastrous first season back in the top flight in 2016–17. Caixinha eventually guided the team into the 2017 summer transfer window.

They finished in third place, well behind Celtic by an incredible 39 points, thus it was obvious that the team needed to be reorganized.

That summer, the Portuguese manager was undoubtedly busy, bringing on seven first-team players who were obviously not part of his plans while also signing 11 players for the Gers.

Additionally, money—which the club didn’t have much of—was spent. While Eduardo Herrera cost £1.5 million, Carlos Pena, a fellow Mexican, was also a high-profile signing; Caixinha spent £2.2 million to entice Pena to Ibrox.

These were expensive sums to spend on given their still precarious financial situation, particularly after their humiliation at the hands of Progres Niederkorn in the Europa League’s first qualifying round.

Pena turned out to be an even worse purchase than Herrera, so it was definitely a waste of £2.2 million for a player who didn’t light up Ibrox with his performances.

The salary Carlos Pena received from the Rangers

The Light Blues were paying Pena £26k a week, an incredible amount for a player who didn’t make an immediate impact, in addition to the lavish transfer fee that was paid to have him signed.

The attacking midfielder did have some prior experience as he had played 191 games for Club Leon in Mexico and contributed 62 goals (ten assists) and goals; this was the kind of form Caixinha was hoping he would continue after joining Rangers.

Pena ultimately made just 14 appearances for the team, starting just six Premiership games and scoring five goals (including a brace against St Johnstone) in that time. However, he also missed a few games due to injury.

It quickly became clear that Pena wouldn’t stay at the team, and three months after Caixinha was fired, in January 2018, he left the team to sign a loan with Cruz Azul in Mexico.

Interestingly, Caixinha had taken over as his new manager after a brief hiatus from football; the move cost the Gers £26k a week, demonstrating how bad a financial deal it was.

Carlos Pena’s whole salary with the Rangers

The midfielder only made 13 appearances for Cruz Azul before his loan agreement was canceled due to alcohol-related problems. After spending time in treatment, he subsequently signed a new temporary contract with Nexaca.

Surprisingly, Rangers continued to pay his full salary during this period of time away from Glasgow despite the loan agreement being terminated, meaning that the Ibrox team suffered a significant loss overall.

In fact, Pena cost the club a total of £3.9 million when you include his £1.7 million salary during his disastrous 84-week stay in Scotland to the £2.2 million transfer fee.

A ludicrous figure, and after failing to appear in a match under Gerrard, he ultimately had his contract terminated in February 2019. The former captain of Liverpool spoke about the termination during a news conference, stating:

“The board has made this choice above me. At a club, certain things occur that are not under the management’s control. We move on because Dave King and the board made the decision, which I respect.

Journalist Derek Clark wrote in 2022 Rangers Review that “in the end, this was a disastrous transfer in what was an equally disastrous spell for the club” following the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s justification of Rangers’ earlier termination of Pena’s contract, seemingly putting an end to the entire ordeal.

Even though there hasn’t been much transfer activity since Pena ultimately left the team, it appears that the Gers now have a manager that is very skilled at moving players about, which should result in fewer bad additions.

Naturally, a player or players will always join a club and fall short of expectations, but Pena had a solid reputation and appeared the part, especially considering his prior performance in Mexico.

It quickly turned out to be a huge financial waste, and even though the Gers are now in a lot better position financially, Clement still cannot afford to spend money on players who will not take responsibility for their actions in order to help the team succeed going forward.

The Rangers are undoubtedly in a considerably better position this year than they were back in 2017 thanks to some wise purchases made during the January transfer window.

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