Michael Beale hailed Ryan Porteous as a “good young player,” but ruled out Rangers making a move,
Porteous has rejected the offer of a new contract at Hibs and as things stand, is set to leave for nothing in the summer. However, the Easter Road club are keen to try and cash in for what they can get in January, with a number of English Championship and League One clubs interested in Porteous, including Millwall, Sunderland and Sheffield Wednesday.
Serie A outfit Udinese are also understood to be monitoring his situation, and Porteous told Sky Sports he was open to the idea of testing himself in a new league. Rangers had been linked with the Scotland international along with city rivals Celtic. But while Beale was impressed with what he saw from Porteous, who headed Hibs into an early lead, he confirmed they weren’t interested in trying to bring him to Ibrox.
"He's not someone we've spoken about,” Beale told BBC Scotland. “To be honest, we've not spoken about any targets right now.
"The club had some targets they maybe had in mind. I've come in, I want to work with this group. Everything has been a bit of a whirlwind over the last two weeks. My focus has firmly been on this group.
"I think Ryan is a good young player. He sort of played in a new position tonight. Fair play to him. He scored a goal and I've seen him come through, really.
"I was here when he made his debut and he's gone on to play for Scotland, but at the moment, I think he's part of their squad and I wouldn't want to speculate on that.
"I know it's come out that he's not going to sign a contract, that means he must have something on his mind. If that's the case, that wouldn't be Rangers as we haven't discussed it yet."
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