Will Russell Martin Break Rangers Transfer Record In Southampton Raid Monday, 9th Jun 2025 08:49 Having been appointed manager of Glasgow giant Rangers, the rumour mill is suggesting that our former manager might be returning to St Mary's for his squad rebuilding at Ibrox, but which players will he be looking to recruit and will he smash Rangers record transfer fee paid. You would think that a club the size of Rangers would have spent big over the years, but the truth is that their record transfer fee was set almost 25 years ago when Torre Andre Flo joined the club from Chelsea and since then there hasn't been a signing by the Gers much over £7 million since, indeed it has only been in the past couple of years that there transfer fee's paid have topped £5 million, the level of fee that they were paying in the mid 90's That is the level that Rangers have been shopping at over the past decade or so after going bust in 2012 and being relegated to the bottom tier of the Scottish football pyramid.
So when footballleagueworld.co.uk suggest that Russell Martin is eyeing up a move for the player he signed for Swansea and then again for Saints, Flynn Downes,. In the last published accounts Rangers lost £17 million and have been in financial strife for the past couple of seasons, however they are in the middle of a takeover by the owners of American Football team the San Francisco 49ers. This could spark a spending spree in the summer and so it could be that Downes is central to that, but he won't come cheap. He signed his permanent deal at St Mary's last summer and is tied to the club until 2028, so Saints are under no pressure to sell, so the starting price for Downes will be in excess of the £16 million they paid to get his services from West Ham United.
The footballleagueworld.co.uk report suggests that Rangers will open up at £10 million, but that is well below his current valuation that stands at around £13 million. So although Saints may be willing to take some loss, they won't want to lose £5-6 million so Rangers will have to smash their transfer record to land Downes. The player himself did not get on with Ivan Juric after his Mentor Martin had departed Saints and looked to emulate Adam Armstrong and go out on loan rather than play under Juric. Whether he is now enthused with the appointment of Will Still and will want to stay is as of yet unknown, however if he does go there he will probably have to take a big pay cut and given his less than average season in the Premier League, he will find it hard to get a club willing to match his Southampton salary. So Russell martin may be thwarted in his pursuit of Downes, but the midfielder won't be the only one on his radar.
Obvious candidate for a move will be Jack Stephens, who seemed to be the pet favourite of Martin who strangely made him Captain and would play him at every opportunity, even inventing a new position for him to pay, the bizarre left back/central midfield hybrid role where Stephens would stroll around from one position to another when the situation merited it. Most Saints fans knew that Captain Jack did not merit a place in the starting line up, I suspect that the player himself was not happy at being elevated to the role of Manager's Pet, I have often criticised Stephens, but I have never been abusive, I see him for where his talents lay, that was being a good solid squad player for the club, a man who could come in and fill a gap when needed, however in my opinion he should never have been a regular starter though. Jack is available on a free transfer and i would be very surprised if he was still at St Mary's in June, his current transfer value is around £1 million, but he will be available on a free and I would expect Martin to snap him up for Rangers.
If he does than good luck to Jack, as I have said he was a player that if he was a regular starter, that was not good from a squad basis, but he always gave 100% and deserves to be given the credit for his service to the club, not remembered for Russell Martin's strange fixation with playing him. At 31 years old it is time to leave Southampton and he will be perfectly adequate in the Scottish Premier. Another player linked will be Joe Aribo, he arrived from Rangers for around £6 million 3 years ago and in my opinion proved to be a decent signing, perhaps he wasn't quite Premier League level, but he was Championship class and if he was to stay this season I wouldn't be too disappointed.
If he was to depart I would expect that Saints would be seeking his current value of around £5-6 million, but I would suspect that Rangers would baulk at his current salary, so this one could come down as to whether Aribo would be willing to take a wage drop for Rangers or indeed any other suitor, or will he want to sit out the final year of his contract and take the money. So there could be 3 players who join up with Russell Martin at Ibrox, but I am sure that Saints fans would be happy to see a few more of our squad coveted by their old boss. All Photos Via Reuters Please report offensive, libellous or inappropriate posts by using the links provided.
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