Kevin Thelwell feels wrath of Rangers hero as recruitment chief told he can't be trusted to oversee January spend
Graeme Souness feels his old club are taking a huge gamble to allow the Englishman to lead another transfer window
Rangers legend Graeme Souness has confessed he wouldn’t trust beleaguered Ibrox sporting director Kevin Thelwell to oversee the club’s January transfer spend - admitting he isn’t sure if they have the funds to “go again” when the window opens.
Souness, who was closely involved with the previous Gers regime - delivered his scathing verdict of the former Everton chief by insisting his old club are taking a major gamble to let him have full control over potential incomings and outgoings.
Thelwell was tasked with rebuilding a crippled squad when he was hired by Rangers’ new American owners during the summer, but his shambolic recruitment raised plenty of eyebrows and left Russell Martin’s successor Danny Rohl with a deeply imbalanced team lacking experience, leaders and goals.
Supporters have ramped up their anger towards Thelwell and CEO Patrick Stewart in recent weeks by staging several protests, with the Englishman’s recent decision to hire his son Robbie to a key scouting role coming under intense criticism.
More notably, his call to sanction the £8 million signing of misfiring striker Youssef Chermiti from the Toffees has led fans to urge Thelwell to be removed from his position immediately.
Graeme Souness slams lack of quality in Rangers squad
Ibrox great Souness has now weighed in by claiming the footballing decisions made so far by Andrew Cavenagh and 49ers Enterprises have left him cold as he slammed the lack of quality on show, despite a whopping sum of £40 million spent on 12 new additions.
Asked if Thelwell should be allowed to oversee another hunt for signings in the New Year, the iconic former player-boss told Sky Bet: “I don’t think so. Unless there is something in these players he’s brought in that I’m not seeing. Some of them are just not good enough.
“All boards of directors look to find young players, pay little money for them, coach them up and make them better and then sell them on for enormous profits – that would appear to be the Rangers business model.
“But I don’t see that happening with the players they’ve signed.
“Would you trust Kevin Thelwell with another chunk of money? I don’t know if Rangers have another chunk of money to go again in the new year.”
Graeme Souness left far from impressed by Rangers’ new American owners
Rohl was tasked with clearing up Martin and Thelwell’s mess last month and the German has managed to foster a sense of unity within the disgruntled fanbase of late.
It has been a challenging start to life in Govan for the ex-Sheffield Wednesday manager with results in the Europa League failing to improve and an Old Firm League Cup semi-final defeat to Celtic at Hampden Park. But things are looking up at least in the Premiership after three consecutive wins in a row.
Despite that improvement, Souness fears it’s a near impossible task with the current state of the Rangers squad.
“Rangers are in a difficult place right now,” he added. “I went on record when the 49ers Enterprise got majority shareholding that I thought that can only be good news because they’ve been involved at Leeds and can just transfer the knowledge and avoid the mistakes they made there. But they’ve been disappointing and their recruitment has been disappointing.
“For me, the most important thing at any football club is not having the best coach, it’s about having the best players. It seems to be a correlation, or a hell of a coincidence, that all the best coaches have the best players – it doesn’t happen by accident. If you’ve not got a great bunch of players, you’re not going to do very well even if you are a top coach.
“Right now, Rangers don’t have the squad that’s going to make them dominant. Neither Celtic nor Rangers are particularly strong right now and the recruitment, so far, has not shown that it’s not been a good transfer window.”