In Kieran Dowell, Rangers have signed a set-piece specialist in the mould of Todd Cantwell.

That’s the view of Chris Reeve from the Talk Norwich City Podcast after watching Dowell closely at Carrow Road over the last three seasons.

The 25-year-old midfielder has penned a three-year contract with the Ibrox club and will officially join up with his new teammates on July 1st.

Dowell has been out of action since February due to a knee injury and that’s something Reeve reckons may give cause for concern. “I have to be honest and say he's not set the world alight at Norwich City,” he told the Rangers Review.

“I would say the main reason for that is he's actually just had a couple of really bad injuries or at least lingering injuries. I think one was with his knee. I forget the other one but he has had a couple of lengthy spells out.

“You have to remember, as well at Norwich City, it's been turbulent. We’ve had a relegation, we've had a promotion and he’s had to work himself back into the side.

“He's had two different managers at Norwich City as well so there’s style changes etc. Unfortunately, I think Kieran's fallen victim to a lot of the Norwich City turbulence, which could comfort Rangers fans here who are a little bit apprehensive perhaps of his injury record.

“What I would say about Kieran Dowell is I'd hugely compliment him on his form of late. When David Wagner came into Norwich City post-Dean Smith, at the beginning of the honeymoon phase, we were playing this sort of proactive attacking football and he started to get the best out of Kieran. He was finding the space and his touch was excellent.

READ MORE: What Rangers can expect from Jose Cifuentes: The LAFC lowdown

“I think Kieran's key strength, I guess similar to Todd Cantwell, is his ability to pick a pass, a through ball or perhaps a lofted cross. He's got an absolutely wicked delivery from a set piece, he's a free-kick specialist. In our title-winning season behind closed doors in in 2020/21, he scored an absolute postage stamp free-kick away at Derby, which was a really important game for us to win and go on and win the title back to the Premier League.

“There are some real key strengths in his game, but at the same time, he has got this lingering injury record.

“If I was the Rangers fan, I would be concerned about that.”

After following Cantwell to Govan, Reeve suggested he may play second fiddle to Rangers’ January acquisition. “When I first saw that Rangers were in for Dowelldinho as we like to call him. We started to call him Dowelldinho because we hadn't really seen much of Kieran Dowell and then all of a sudden he had like this purple patch of form where he was just scoring outstanding goals, these brilliant set pieces, bits of skill twists and turns so we started calling him Dowelldinho. Anyway, I was a bit surprised because of the fact that you've signed Todd Cantwell.

“I've got a weird feeling that he might potentially be a player that's been signed as a backup to Todd.

Rangers Review:

“The reason why I say that is he often does play through the middle. He's played left and he’s played right at times for Norwich City. He is one of those versatile players that can play multiple positions. Similar to Todd actually, to a certain degree, although Todd will tell you he definitely wants to play through the middle and not out wide.

“He could play multiple roles and it just gives Rangers options if there are injuries or if you have to change tactics based upon the opposition you’re coming up against.”

Despite his injury problems, Reeve reckons Dowell can prove to be an asset. “An important thing to say is that I don't think he ever found what I would call his rhythm for Norwich City,” he said.

“He never got a consistent string of games, really. If Rangers can give Kieran the space and time to find his rhythm and give him consistent game time and he could be a player that then just doesn't have those little injuries because he's just used to that sort of requirement in terms of the consistency of games that he needs to play.

“I don't think it's a signing that I would be buzzing about, but it is a signing that if I was a Rangers fan I would go, ‘Yeah, that's a decent signing. I'm quite happy with that.’”