Tom Lawrence

Tom Lawrence, who arrived on this spinning globe on the 13th of January in the year of our Lord 1994, hails all the way from the rolling hills of Wales and now plies his trade in Scotland for those distinguished chaps at Rangers. Taking up the decidedly humdrum and unoriginal position of a central attacking midfielder, the man stands at a not-half-bad height of 5ft10in (or 1.8m for those of you favouring the metric system) and weighs in at a respectable 11st 11lb (or 75kg for those on continental Europe's preferred scale). His career in kicking a ball about began at the illustrious institution of Manchester United, yet it appears they saw little in Lawrence to retain his services. No, instead they deemed him fit for a loan spell at League Two's Carlisle United back in November 2013. Fair to say, his record for the North West club wasn't exactly setting the world alight – a measly three goals from nine appearances. From Carlisle, Lawrence then slummed it even further with Yeovil Town in the National League after another bout of rejection from Man United’s elite in January 2014. Nineteen appearances, two goals, maintaining a fine tradition of mediocrity. Following his brief romance with Yeovil Town, Lawrence then found himself back in the Premier League, moving to the now fading glory of Leicester City in 2014 for what I'm sure they now realise was a rather over-inflated fee of £1.2m, especially considering he only graced the pitch for a paltry three league games. Unsurprisingly, he found himself loaned off again, this time to Rotherham United, and again matters didn't change with a single goal from six appearances. Post-Rotherham, it seems Lawrence decided he’d had enough of the Premier League and downgraded himself to the Championship, spending loan periods at Blackburn Rovers and Cardiff City in quick succession. Another spell of sliding down the relevancy scale followed as he was then shuttled off to Ipswich on loan before finally finding a semblance of stability with Derby County, where he transferred to in the fading summer of 2017 for, honestly, an absurd figure of £5m. He produced 38 appearances and 11 goals in his final season there – still not impressive, really, but apparently enough for Rangers to take a punt on him in 2022. As a player for Rangers, his record is just as underwhelming. Would you believe it, merely four goals in 36 appearances in his first Scottish seasons? Genius, isn't he? In the ongoing season, he’s already graced the back of the net thrice in eight appearances – a bumper year by his standards. Oh, and he's also dabbled in some fancy international competitions, like the League Cup, Europa League and Champions League Qualifiers where he's scored the grand total of… three times. So there you have it, Lawrence in all his footballing glory. A journeyman midfielder making the simplest of moves and scoring an unremarkable amount of goals. Astonishing. Truly.