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Bedoya agrees to terms with Glasgow Rangers

AlejandroBedoya (Getty)

U.S. national team midfielder Alejandro Bedoya is set to follow in the footsteps of an impressive list of current and former Americans to play for Scottish powerhouse Glasgow Rangers after agreeing to terms with the club on Thursday.

Bedoya confirmed the agreement on Monday, and is now awaiting the securing of a work permit to finalize his move from Swedish club Orebro to Rangers, where he will team up with U.S. teammate Maurice Edu.

Rangers had been working with Orebro on a transfer for Bedoya for this summer, but after failing to reach an agreement on a transfer deal, Bedoya secured a pre-contract with Rangers on Thursday. Bedoya will move on a free transfer and begin a three-year contract with Rangers in January if he is able to secure a work permit, Bedoya's agent, Lyle Yorks, told SBI on Thursday.

Bedoya was enjoying a strong season in Sweden, and is coming off an impressive showing for the United States at the CONCACAF Gold Cup. The former Boston College standout will now play for the same club that former U.S. captain Claudio Reyna and American winger DaMarcus Beasley previously called home.

What do you think of this development? Like the move for Bedoya? Think he can shine in Scotland?

Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. “I think you’d find it REALLY hard to bench your son.”

    Maybe you would.

    None of us know BB well enough to know whether that is how he operates. He may genuinely believe MB is worth his place. It wouldn’t be the first time a manager disagrees with the fans on the value of a player.

    I suspect we have all been in the workplace long enough to see examples where a father was twice as hard on their son in the interest of not being seen as biased.

    I’ve seen lots of cases where parental bosses have treated their kids like crap.

    Saying MB plays so much purely out of nepotism is jsut an easy out. If Mo wants to beart MB out then he needs to prove he’s the better man. But when I see him play for the USMNT he just seems lost. I thought he was better than that.

    Obviously BB knows MB and his ins and outs better than anyone else. In a national teamsituation where players often come in and out all the time familiarity and confidence in a player is vital.

    Look around at other national teams and you will find that managers often have a core of “their guys”. In fact, look at Mourinho and see how often he drags Carvalho around with him.

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  2. Better players than Wondo have missed better sitters than what he had in the Panama game.

    I do blame him for the loss but he still hasn’t had enough caps to prove he is a USMNT bust.

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  3. Not according to UEFA. They have these rankings for seeding purposes.

    I’ve never seen a Cyprus league game myself (have you?) so I really don’t know how to react to anything past the top ten or so.

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  4. I think you’d find it REALLY hard to bench your son.

    This is not to say that he doesn’t deserve to start. MB is solid; I think he’s our best player pound-for-pound, position-for-position. But, you can’t deny that having a father coaching a son on a national team might screw some things up just a teensy bit in that locker room / front office.

    Edu riding pine for the USMNT is likely due to the fact that we actually have some depth at holding CM, which I think everybody should be happy about. I’d like to argue that he should be taking some of Jermaine’s minutes, but I think Jermaine’s grittiness edged him past Edu for the other spot (and Edu is a natural sub for Jones since he’s always getting carded).

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  5. Apparently you misunderstood Andy’s comment. He was adding Kasey Keller to the list…and then he was qualifying Brede Hangeland – on a side note.

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  6. First name — Chris Wondolowski.

    Ay papa, he was invisible in the USMNT shirt aside from that dreadful attempt with a gaping net against Panama.

    Your point is solid; I probably wouldn’t trust MLS results either if I was a Euro manager / boardroom member.

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  7. Will he?

    I suppose you’re assuming that Rangers will be out by January (which is very possible; no criticism intended). In that case, clever way to state it 8)

    BUT, should Rangers still be in the competition by then (maybe there’s one more group game in Jan??), Bedoya would be ligible if Oreobro isn’t in the UCL, I think.

    Can somebody help us out on this? As long as he isn’t UCL tied, he would be able to step right in, no? I’d love to watch him and Edu in a UCL game.

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  8. Cyprus had a nice statue once, though.

    Point duly noted, and in addition, I really think that once you get past that first 6 or 7, it really starts to be splitting hairs between the rest of that top 20. The FIFA rankings are unreliable in my opinion, so I take UEFA rankings with a grain of salt as well.

    That being said, the Turkish league IS probably a step up from the Swedish league, if only for the fact that they have Fenerbache, Galatasaray, and one or 2 other relatively strong sides.

    Whether the SPL is better than Turkey is debatable; I think the SPL can harden a player a bit more, but you have to think that the Turks (based on their NT) know a thing or two about pretty football.

    At the end of the day, Bedoya didn’t waste time in securing a move to a place with a familiar language, and NT compatriot, that showed genuine interest in him. No use holding out for a ‘better’ option; I like that he welcomes the challenge and is ready to take the next step in his career.

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  9. Michael Bradley plays for the USMNT. I didn’t know there was a Bob Bradley Jr. What club team does he play for?

    Edu’s USMNT performances have, overall, been pretty subdued since he came back from injury.

    If nepotism is keeping him behind M. Bradley then one way he can beat that is to play better in practice and better during whatever time he has on the field. I don’t see the practices but Mo has been pretty vanilla in his recent USMNT appearances. If he is going to let a little thing like nepotism get in his way and not fight back then maybe he doesn’t have the fight and the fire to be a top flight player anyway.

    And he did not exactly respond well to being given an opportunity for more PT by seizing on the CB role offered to him. Mo is a fine, versatile player and he could be a better all around center back than Tim Ream based on what I’ve seen of Ream lately.

    Rangers are poorer than my state government so buying is conservative and Mo faces little real competition for his place.

    One possible interpretation of all this is that Mo has gotten soft at Rangers and doesn’t react well to competition.

    Or you could be right and BB is intentionally narrowing his own profesional options by denying playing time to and alientating one of his most talented players, a man he could really use, for reasons ground in nepotism.

    I would view that as blatant stupidity and professional suicide on the part of BB given the complete lack of depth of the US player pool but I suppose anything is possible.

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  10. Maybe that’s because previous MLS leading goalscorers haven’t exactly impressed at higher levels (Casey, Cunningham, Cooper, any more guys with last names starting with C?).

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