Romanian legend Gica Popescu has revealed the lengths Ianis Hagi went to get himself back to fitness after he returned from over a year out to play for Rangers.
The Ibrox ace finally returned to action in their weekend win over St Johnstone as a sub to end over 12 months of frustration following his serious knee injury suffered in a Scottish Cup tie against Stirling Albion last year.
And Popescu - a former teammate of Iani's famous father Gheorghe Hagi at Barcelona and now president of Farul Constanta, the club that Hagi senior manages - hailed his comeback as a huge moment for football in his country.
Popescu said: "Ianis Hagi being back on the football pitch is a very important moment for Romanian football.
"He is back after a year of torment. It's important for him, it's important for Rangers and it is very important for our national team.
"I stayed with Ianis during this period when he was supposed to be on holiday on a ten-day break.
"I knew Ianis was a very serious guy, but I never imagined him to be so conscientious.
"He actually took his personal trainer and his physio on holiday with him so he could still put the work in.
"Every morning for the whole time he was with us, he did four hours of work from 8am to midday and then recovered in the afternoon. And that was when he was supposed to be on his holiday.
"So I was so happy to see him back in a Rangers shirt. He absolutely deserves this.
"The older you get, the harder it is to fully recover from a serious injury. But I am convinced that by the summer he will be the player he was before the injury."
Meanwhile, Antonio Colak hopes to get back among the goals when Rangers visit Hearts for the second time this season on Wednesday night.
The Croatia international scored a double in the Light Blues’ 4-0 win at Tynecastle in October, on his way to notching 14 goals in his first 24 appearances for the Ibrox men in all competitions since signing from Greek side PAOK last summer.
Colak was troubled by injury when Michael Beale took over as boss from Giovanni van Bronckhorst at the end of November and had to go off against Dundee United at half-time in his first appearance under the new regime earlier in the month with a knock.
Colak made substitute appearances against St Johnstone both in the Scottish Cup and the league in recent weeks as he works his way back to full fitness and is looking to get back to business.
He said: “I’m a really active guy. I always want to be involved. I want to play and score.
“It’s not easy for me to watch from the outside, but I’m really happy with how the team is doing and how everything has now developed with the new manager.
“Of course, I wanted to impress him directly from the first day but the small injuries took me out a little bit. But now I’m coming back fit so everything is fine.
“I always see everything positive. There are a lot of games coming up where I can be involved, where I can show my quality again and score. This is what I’m looking for.
“It’s a nice atmosphere there (Tynecastle), a tough game. I like these kinds of games, but I think everywhere where you go in Scotland, to away games, it’s a fired-up atmosphere.
“I’m looking forward to the game, I hope to be involved, to make the game a good memory for me and the team.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here