Barrie McKay was widely considered to be one of the brightest talents to come from the Rangers academy at one point in time, but the young winger was sold by Pedro Caixinha to Nottingham Forest for £500,000 in 2017. The youngster was a regular for the Tricky Trees and managed a decent haul of five goals and seven assists in the previous season. However, after a manager change at the club, he was shipped to Swansea City in the 2018 summer transfer window. The player recently opened up about how he feels a tad unlucky and talks about the possibility of returning to Rangers.
He was quoted as saying,”If, later on in my career, it came back up I would seriously think about going back (To Rangers). At the time I did leave Rangers, it was the same as Forest, I never really had the choice. I was made aware that they didn’t want me so it was more or less getting out and getting playing.
“I went to Forest and I was playing all the time but then the same thing happened with the change of manager. I have been unfortunate, I think, but these things happen in football. It was tough to take. It is difficult for any footballer when you go from being first choice to not really playing at all. It can be mentally tough but I think it has helped me a lot and it will help me deal with things in my career”
At Ibrox, under Mark Warburton, the winger flourished and put in some impressive displays, before being sold by Caixinha. His stats for the Light Blues are impressive as he scored 20 and provided 39 assists in 140 appearances. Many believe the club made a mistake by selling him especially below the £1m mark and maybe the Bears could look to rectify the mistake by bringing him back in the future.
However, after making 15 signings in the summer including quite a few left-wingers (Ryan Kent, Jamie Murphy and Eros Grezda all can play in that role), we don’t really see the Gers being too interested in their former player at this point. Maybe if Gerrard fails to land Kent on a permanent basis after his loan spell ends, then a move for McKay might make sense.
The 23-year-old can also play in a more central attacking midfield role so if the Liverpool legend is interested in a player in that position; this move makes some sense. So far Gerrard has used much deeper players and central midfielders like Ovie Ejaria and Scott Arfield for the attacking midfield role.
At this point, the move in January is unlikely to happen as he joined Swansea in the summer only. However, McKay is very likely to be back at Ibrox in the considerable future like Allan McGregor and Kyle Lafferty if he continues the good work he has been doing ever since he left the club.
