Gordon Smith’s role with Craig Whyte was to oversee the football matters. Today, the former Director of Football has opened up on why he barely could.
Smith was brought in back in June 2011, and was looking forward to helping Ally McCoist push the club forward. What he was in for, instead, was a huge disaster.
Fans won’t need reminding of Whyte’s time in charge at Ibrox. He led the club to administration before then going through the embarrassment of being liquidated.
This set Rangers back years, and Whyte is now roundly vilified by anyone with any form of common sense.
Smith, however, was today speaking in the Daily Record’s Rangers podcast. He said that he knew Whyte was never a Rangers fan, and couldn’t understand why he was wanting to be the owner of the club.
“I got the impression he [Whyte] was not a football guy – he didn’t know the game. It made me wonder why he’s doing this. He never knew much about the game at all, he was never a fan that watched the games.
“I thought I could offer a lot of qualities. Because I was director of football, some people assumed I was a director of the club as well and I wasn’t.
“Craig Whyte was called away to make a phone call and that’s when he was informed about administration and that was a major blow to everyone at the club and myself thinking, ‘Where am I going to go here?
“Duff and Phelps were in within a week, they said where it was going and I said, ‘There’s no point in me being here anymore, I’m leaving,’ and I just left immediately.”
The disastrous regime
The impact of the disastrous work done by Whyte is still being felt around Ibrox today. Rangers are currently in a rebuilding job under Steven Gerrard. Whilst things are going very well so far, the Gers wouldn’t be in the position they now are if Whyte was never involved.
It’ll never be known just how big a figure Smith could’ve been at the club. In a sense, he could’ve been a real gem had he been allowed to do his job.
The former Chief Executive of the SFA had much experience as an agent and coach. Helping develop McCoist and ensure he settled into the role would’ve been ideal at the time.
Instead, Rangers legend McCoist was forced to watch the likes of Whyte destroy the club he loved before having to try and build it back up again.
The whole saga seems to have led to the former Rangers manager losing his appetite for the job. Recently, McCoist stated that he was glad to leave the manager’s role and didn’t want to return to it in any capacity.
Nowadays, McCoist and Smith both do punditry work for a variety of TV and radio stations.
Meanwhile, Whyte’s trail of destruction is still being felt. But Rangers fans can be safe in the knowledge the club moving forward once more.
