Jordan Jones has started life as Rangers player with a bit of a flourish.

The Gers support like his direct style and opposition defences hate coming up his electric pace.

In his first nine appearances as a Gers player Jones has popped up with two important assists in the Europa League, the last coming in midweek as his great cross found Alfredo Morelos who headed Rangers into the group stages (Rangers FC Match Report).

Rangers boss Steven Gerrard seems to be very impressed by his new summer signing:

“Jordan Jones did not get many numbers today in terms of assists or goals, but he was outstanding. Look at our second goal, it was a great move.”

Via Hitc

Now the Northern Ireland internationalist certainly seems to have the skill-set to become a difference maker at Ibrox.

But if I can take you back to Gerrard’s praise of Jones, it’s interesting that he mentioned that the former Kilmarnock winger’s lack of goals and assists.

Last season at Killie in the Scottish Premiership, Jordan finished the campaign with four goals and four assists. He should be looking to double that goals tally and get double figures in terms of making assists this term at Rangers .

In regard of improving his goal and assist stats, the Rangers man could look across the city and try and emulate Celtic wide-man James Forrest.

In the 2015-16, Forrest made nineteen top flight appearances for the Scottish champions and he scored just twice and created a single assist.

Compare that to last term and he scored eleven goals and made twelve assists in the Premiership alone. He’s also started this year with a bang, scoring six times and creating five assists. James has netted in each of his last four European appearances for the Hoops.

Before Brendan Rodgers arrived it looked to be a certainty that Forrest would leave Celtic Park. He was struggling to stay in the first team under Ronny Deila, had persistent issues with his hamstrings and had even rejected a new contract in early 2016 (Source Sky Sports).

Then Rodgers arrived and things seemed to click for Forrest at Celtic. Since then he has gone on to become an integral player for both Celtic and Scotland.

He always had the skills and pace to be a threat on the wing but he then added a killer instinct in front of goal and created hatfuls of chances for teammates.

It was as if Rodgers had convinced James that he could be a superstar for Celtic and as the winger started playing regularly without any injury set-backs he just continued to improve.

Rangers will hope that Jordan Jones can have the same impact in Govan.

Gerrard clearly likes the player and will hope that Jordan can also add more goals and assists to his game. The player has shown against FC Midtjylland and Legia Warsaw that he can be a valuable threat in the bigger games.

It’s not often that one side of Glasgow can take inspiration from the other side but James Forrest has shown that with hard work and confidence you can go from a decent winger to a consistent match winner, now Jordan Jones will hope he can start to do the same for Rangers!

Posted on August 31st, 2019 by scott
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