McLeish seeks cash for Euro run

RANGERS manager Alex McLeish has called on the club’s board to make sure his squad remains strong enough to get into the Champions League.

Domestically, the season has been nothing but glorious for McLeish and his players, who lifted all three trophies. The 1-0 victory over Dundee in the Scottish Cup final was enough to clinch a seventh treble in McLeish’s first full season in charge.

But the club is under huge financial pressure as debts that were last posted at £52m are believed to have risen even further in the past few months.

Arthur Numan and Michael Mols picked up winners’ medals but are set to leave the club.

And Lorenzo Amoruso, who headed the only goal of the game, is the subject of a £1.5m bid by Blackburn which the Ibrox board is unlikely to turn down.

Celtic’s run to the final of the UEFA Cup has put McLeish under pressure to do well in the Champions League next season, however, and that would guarantee welcome millions.

Rangers will have to get through one qualifying round to reach the group stage and will discover on July 25 who is to stand in their way. McLeish has already lined up signings.

He has now lifted five trophies out of five since taking over from Dick Advocaat in December, 2001 at a time when Celtic had already all but wrapped up that season’s championship under Martin O’Neill. O’Neill won all three domestic trophies in his first campaign, two seasons ago.

Amoruso’s 66th-minute header meant Rangers retained the cup and clinched their seventh treble.

DUNDEE: Speroni, Mackay (Milne 78), Khizanishvili, Smith, Hernandez Santos, Rae (Brady 85), Nemsadze, Mair, Burchill (Novo 71), Caballero, Lovell.

RANGERS: Klos, Malcolm, Moore, Amoruso, Numan (Muscat 69), Ricksen, Ferguson, de Boer, McCann, Arveladze (Thompson 56), Mols (Ross 45).