What Rangers boss has said about transfer future of ace wanted by West Ham as financial reality kicks in again
West Ham United have been linked with a transfer move for the Rangers attacker.
He’s an apparent target for West Ham United - but what has the Rangers boss said about one of his better performers?
Vaclav Cerny is spending the season on loan at Ibrox from Wolfsburg. With an Abdallah Sima-sized hole to fill from last campaign, the Czech international has turned one of Rangers’ better players in an overall difficult campaign to date for the Light Blues.
It’s been claimed that La Liga side Villarreal and Premier League outfit West Ham are both keen to sign him, with his long-term future unclear. West Ham are claimed to be the favourites amid English football’s financial upper-hand and Ibrox boss Philippe Clement has already discussed Cerny’s future.
He admits that in a repeat of the Sima situation, finances will dictate what Rangers can do in terms of a permanent deal. Speaking in early December 2024, Clement said: “I had these discussions with the board in June when everybody knew the numbers of the season and the years before.
“So in that moment that we knew we had to reduce the wages a lot because it's a big reduce. And if you make a comparison, the numbers from one year, if you compare with two years ago or three years ago, it's even more. So the wages had to be lowered a lot. One of the points that we talked about is having players on loan.
“It's something we need for the moment because we don't have the money to buy Vaclav for the moment or we didn't have the money to buy Abdallah at that moment. But we need to see and we need to try every year to have one player less on loan and one player more that's an asset for the club.
“Because we're going to have a similar situation at the end of the season in that way. And Abdallah wanted to stay here, loved to stay here. But of course other teams are also interested in one moment. He chooses also for his career, for his wages, for everything.
“So of course, all the club wants to lower the amount of players on loan. And that's a strategy for the next couple of years. But you cannot solve all these problems in one transfer window.
“What we did to make the team younger and also that it was a gap with seven players leaving for free. People don't realise that but you need to replace them by seven players so you need a budget for that also. So all these things in consideration. That's a strategy for the future.”