Joe Garner’s goals, and how he could be the perfect signing for Rangers

Alright, we know that Joe Garner's record last season wasn't too great in front of goal, and that Youtube goal videos, by definition, do not include skied sitters, balls trapped into touch and hitting the corner flag with a volley. That's not to say, however, that they're useless. They show Garner doing what he does best, and how he gets his goals, and thus how he could best fit into Mark Warburton's system. And the results are promising.

For a start, Warburton has constantly been derided for not having a Plan B. The fact that his "do Plan A better" approach has generally worked to drag us out of poor spells has mitigated this (although starting to play a proper defensive midfielder was one tweak he conceded to last season.) Garner undoubtedly brings a Plan B to the table. A huge number of his goals are scored not only by crosses, but by aimless high punts into the box, resulting in him successfully bullying the defender to the ball and slamming it into the net. So there is that.

We've covered the question of whether a proper number 9 was even desirable for Rangers before, but it seems Mr Warburton doesn't agree. Whether we'll actually resort to hoofing it up to big Joe is doubtful, and we probably won't need to either - the last problem this Rangers team have is getting the ball to stick up front. There's no question though, that all teams become more direct when their striker is a human battering ram.

The advantage though, is that he does score from crosses. Most of the goals in the video are thumping headers, and the service doesn't even appear to be particularly good. This is something Rangers definitely lack - Martyn Waghorn only seems to score either penalties or curling peaches into the top corner. As a penalty box player, he's been pretty ineffective, and Garner should help to give us a serious, deadly weapon to thump crosses from James Tavernier, Lee Wallace, Michael O'Halloran and Barrie McKay into the net. League One is about the level of most of the SPFL, so he should have no problems bullying defenders and scoring a shedload of goals.

Garner's workrate and aggression are also self-evident in the video. Unfortunately, however, so is a pretty poor (or at least inconsistent) touch. That's quite a surprise, as he doesn't seem like a Warburton player at all. But then, Rangers have Niko Kranjcar, Barrie McKay and Harry Forrester to produce neat passing triangles and maneouvre in tight spaces. Their job is to then put it on the head or boot of Garner, at which point it will, if the video is anything to go by, end up flying towards the top corner at 90mph.

It's hard to see Garner not being a success in terms of his goal return in the SPFL. As a player so radically different to everything we presently have, it'll be interesting to see how the introduction of such a player affects the team. We'd expect him to hit the ground running in terms of his goalscoring, but Warburton clearly thinks a more physical unit up front can improve our overall play, too. He might be right - how many times have Wallace or Tavernier ghosted into a great position down the left and only Kenny Miller and maybe Andy Halliday are waiting for the cross? It'll give us another attacking option, and make us more unpredictable and versatile in attack as a result. At least, that's the plan. We'll be waiting to see how it works out.

P.S. Oh, and there's also one other advantage for signing Garner. Lest anyone thought our team was becoming a bit, well, Arsenal in having too many nice polite young lads, Garner appears to have the potential to be a right wee prick (https://vine.co/v/ebAAlzP2Xa0) and will surely be loathed by everybody else as a result. And then they'll really know we're back.