Alex McLeish endorses EBT reunion at Ibrox

Alex McLeish has given his backing to moves to install Kev Muscat as manager at Ibrox.

McLeish picked up £1.7m for his four years managing Rangers. During that time he signed Muscat from Millwall, he played 26 matches and had £1m paid into his Employee Benefit Trust.

EBT- DISGUISED REMUNERATION

The fund was offshore allowing Muscat to spend it without deductions for Income Tax and National Insurance. In July 2017 the Supreme Court ruled that the payments were disguised remuneration.

It would have required payment of around £1.75m being paid through the books to have deposited a similar sum in Muscat’s bank account with around £750,000 going to Her Majesty to pay for schools, hospitals, pensions and the armed forces.

With bears reacting aggressively towards links with Danny Rohl attention has switched to the boss of Shanghai Port. The Chinese side will expect significant compensation for their manager.

The Chinese League season runs until November 22 but that problem can be resolved through Neil McCann. He picked up an EBT for £500,000.

McLeish brought the duo together for a season, speaking to The Sun he said:

Musky will know what’s needed having been there and done it.

Being at the club would have been good for his education of Glasgow Rangers.

I know there are a number of people being talked about as contenders but Musky is definitely someone with the character and personality to do a good job.

There are claims that Muscat is on a salary of around £3m a year in China, he would need to be offered around £6m a year at Ibrox to maintain that level of income.

THE REUNION

McCann is clearly primed to step in at a minutes notice with Billy Dodds likely to tag along.

Both of them were part of Barry Ferguson’s management team last season but Ferguson won’t be returning.

Only the manager’s job on a permanent basis will do for the Daily Record columnist.

Getting a management team in place for Saturday’s match against Dundee United is the priority and a clear challenge. U-19 coach Steven Smith has been in charge of training this week.

McCann has his training drills ready but it looks like he’ll have a maximum of two training sessions to prepare a squad that has won just once in their first eight SPFL matches.

If the move falls through McCann will be on Sky Sports duty for Celtic’s match at Dundee on Sunday.

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