Walter Smith has admitted that Rangers can’t afford to hold on to half of their first team squad.
Fresh from watching Kris Boyd and Nacho Novo walk out on the club the Rangers boss has confirmed that he couldn’t afford to turn down any realistic offer for nine of his remaining players.
Kevin Thompson has already been the subject of an offer from Middlesbrough with Lee McCulloch, Kenny Miller, Sasa Papac and Andy Webster also into the final year of their contracts.
With nothing realistic to offer those players any realistic offer is likely to be accepted rather than watching players leave for nothing next summer.
The alarm bells over Rangers financial problems started in January 2009 when Sir David Murray tried to force through the sale of Boyd to Birmingham for £2m against the players wishes.
Rangers haven’t signed anyone since August 2008 and despite the celebrations that accompanied Smith’s decision to stay on for another season the veteran boss has admitted that the club’s financial position remains grim.
“The problem we have is a simple one,” Smith admitted. “We currently can’t offer anything significant to the boys who are out of contract at the end of the season.
“The likelihood is that, as with Boyd, we would be unable to offer those players the kind of deals they would want before they become Bosmans so we have to look at any inquiry.
“Some of the players we are talking about may command a level of pay elsewhere which is out of our reach. That’s essentially what has happened with Boyd.”
Murray’s decision to officially take Rangers off the market confirmed that there is no interest in putting fresh funds into the club.
Smith managed to persuade Llyods TSB away from further savage budget cuts but claims of a £5m transfer war-chest won’t go far in the current market.
Any signings are likely to come from within the SPL or imported Bosman deals along the lines of Jerome Rothen who spent four months at Rangers last season on loan from Paris St Germain.
The free spending days of his first stint at Ibrox are a distant memory for Smith when he would routinely sign up the best emerging Scottish players and was able to compete with Premiership clubs to bring players like Paul Gascoigne and Brian Laudrup to the Rangers.
Looking at the current position Smith admitted: “We have got a bit to spend, but it’s not entirely fair to say that money that comes in will automatically go back to the team, it won’t.
“We’ll hopefully keep the ones that we’ve got but if somebody did enquire, we would have to give it consideration.
“Maybe the financial aspects of the club have been caused by large investment in the team. We have to look after the club’s welfare at the moment, maybe to the detriment of the team, to a degree, but hopefully not.
“I would hope to get a couple (of players) in and if we don’t lose anybody, that’s us on course financially to keep the club as it is. If we lose one or two players, it starts to become a problem for us.”
As well as Thompson, Miller, McCulloch, Webster and Papac being out of contract next summer Neil Alexander, Andreas Velicka, Danny Wilson and Davie Weir are also into the final year of their current deals.
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R*ngers are sniffing about players. Numerous phone calls are being made to Dundee offering them everything but the kitchen sink for Goodwillie and Gomis.
They are trying to use youngsters and fringe players as make weights.
The announcement that accompanied The Cardies re-signing (sic) that they had money to spend was so ludicrous it should have been conducted by a fleet of vuvuzelas and had pixie dust being thrown in the air
‘for every fiver they spend…i will spend a tenner ha ha ha ‘