Rangers were knocked out of the Scottish Cup by Aberdeen on Tuesday night.
Lee McCulloch has claimed that senior Rangers duo Jermain Defoe and Steven Davis haven’t ‘clicked’ and the January signings aren’t ‘match fit’.
Steven Gerrard added the experienced duo to his squad during the winter transfer window when they made the switch from the English Premier League to the Scottish Premiership.
Since moving to Ibrox, Defoe has started four Premiership matches for his side, while midfielder Davis has only been named in the starting XI in three league games.
Speaking to Sky Sports News (13/03/2019 at 10:25 am), McCulloch insisted that Defoe and Davis were ‘fantastic’ additions for the club, but it just hasn’t worked out the manner in which they would have liked.
“On paper, and in my opinion, Jermain Defoe and Steven Davis have been fantastic signings but they’ve not been match fit,” McCulloch told Sky Sports News.
“Defoe’s got a good goal return record when you look at it and Davo’s not just had that game time to help him get up to match sharpness. You can’t argue with the recruitment. It’s just not clicked the way they wanted it to click.”
On Tuesday night, the Gers suffered a damaging 2-0 home defeat to Aberdeen which knocked them out of the Scottish Cup and all but ended their hopes of lifting any silverware this term.
Both Defoe and Davis were brought off from the bench by Gerrard, but neither player was able to make an impact as they will now turn their focus back on the league and trying to end the season on a high.
Since moving to the club, Davis has played 10 matches in all competitions for Rangers, starting only four of those encounters and supplying his teammates with two assists [transfermarkt].
As for Defoe, he has had to contend with trying to knock key man Alfredo Morelos off his perch, but the highly-rated youngster is immovable. But that hasn’t stopped Defoe from scoring five goals in eight league games [transfermarkt].
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