MICHAEL Beale tonight responded to reports linking Rangers with Australian internationalist Harry Souttar – and Ridvan Yilmaz with a move out of Ibrox.
Beale described stories stating that he was looking to add Leicester City centre half Souttar – the brother of his current defender John – to his squad as “lazy”.
And he also stressed Turkish left back Yilmaz, who is currently sidelined by an injury, as “very happy” in the wake of his side’s 2-1 win over Servette in the first leg of a Champions League third qualifying round double header.
“Harry Souttar?” he said. “There might be a bit of lazy stuff around that because his brother plays for us and he follows our club. If there is any news on that then you will be the first to know.”
Asked about Yilmaz, he added: “There is nothing to report this evening. Ridvan is very happy despite losing his best mate Fashion Sakala and he will return to training next week.”
Beale, whose team lost their cinch Premiership opener against Kilmarnock 1-0 at Rugby Park on Saturday, admitted he was frustrated that Rangers failed to beat Servette, who were reduced to 10 men in the second-half, by a more comfortable scoreline.
However, the Englishman, whose team play their Swiss rivals in Geneva in the second leg next Tuesday night, confessed that he was encouraged by both the improved performance and victory.
“We started really really well and I thought the energy from the team was really good in and out of possession,” he said. “The desire shown by Nico (Raskin) and Todd before the first goal to go chase a couple of lost causes down was fantastic.
“I felt Borna Barisic had a good night and put some great crosses in. Playing with the two No 9s gives you that opportunity that we got when Danilo went across the first post and Cyriel scores. At that moment we were in a great place. But after that I thought we were wasteful.
“Then comes the VAR decision for the penalty. I thought it was harsh, but that’s the ruling. In the second half, their keeper made a fantastic save from Sam (Lammers) and Cyriel and we had other moments again where we were wasteful on a night when we played well in my opinion for a long period of time."
Beale added: “What it does is keep our wits about us. We know it will be difficult going to Geneva. It’s going to be a full house and we’ll see a different game like we always do in Europe.
“I’ll never knock a win in European competition because I know they’re so difficult to come by. But as a team, we do a lot of good things and create enormous opportunities and we have to be more decisive.
“I’ll give our forwards (a break) at the moment because they’re new coming into the club and it’s early in the season. But if we keep creating chances like that then we have to take them if we’re to put teams away.
“It’s been a tough few days. I thought the players approached tonight really well. They were dominant in the game. They pushed and pushed and pushed. It’s more like what I want to see from the team. There was more forward running, higher pressure and we’ll approach the game very similarly next week.
“Obviously Servette will have to go for the game and that means it’s going to be an open tie. But if you look around Europe this week there’s been interesting results so I’m pleased to get the win. We need to focus strongly on Livingston now before we think about next Tuesday.”
