Rangers chief: Investment '˜not fit for purpose' under former boss

Rangers chairman Dave King aimed a swipe at former Rangers boss Pedro Caixinha at the club's AGM.

Discussing the club’s final figures over the last year, King explained that the club took a significant hit when they failed to progress past the first qualifying round of the Europa League, as they were dumped out by Luxembourg minnow Progres Niederkorn.

He also blamed the Portuguese boss for his failed signing policy, which he said was “doubly problematic” for the club’s bottom line.

The 2018 Rangers AGM at the Clyde Auditoriam. Picture: SNS

“We started last season with a new manager, a new coaching staff, and a raft of new players including the flagship signing of a European Championship-winning centre-back,” King said.

“The great disappointment is that our investment at the start of last season proved to be not fit for purpose. We embarrassingly lost our Europa League first-round qualifier to a team with an extremely modest European pedigree (Progres Niederkorn).

“Unfortunately, domestic performances continued to be poor during the first half of the season and reached a point where the board considered that the resources we had available to us would not be able to turn things around. We reluctantly parted ways with a manager who had worked tirelessly on behalf of the club.

He added: “The impact of not getting the best out of our investment in players is doubly problematic. Not only did we lose out on performance on the pitchweek in and week out, we also lost value when trying to move players on as they were not perceived to be successful at Ibrox which damaged their value to other clubs. This meant that the board was continually having to provide new funds for player arrivals while getting zero or very low values for those going out.

“That poor quality transfer activity could not continue without threatening everything we have sought to build over the last three years.”