Graeme Souness reveals massive hint about Walter Smith

In a throwback to the 80s, former manager Graeme Souness has admitted something which sheds significant light on Walter Smith’s success in the 90s and 2007-.

As Rangers fans of a certain vintage know, Souness came to Ibrox in the late 80s as player coach to take the reins following the club’s barren spell of the first portion of the decade. He came with Walter Smith as his assistant and fans will well remember Souness’ debut at Easter Road which couldn’t have been more chaotic if it tried.

However, in the recent build up to the ultimately disappointing Old Firm of some weeks ago, Souness dropped a very telling hint about his assistant which brings Smith’s own success into focus.

He said:

“I was out there on the pitch, it was Walter who was the manager at the side.”

Player coaches aren’t the most commonly used commodity in world football, but Souness appears to be suggesting that during his time at Ibrox, at worst he and Smith were equals and complete peers and at best Walter was the actual manager and Souness, while presumably having the final say, relied on him a lot more than a manager normally would on his number one.

It gives insight as to why, when Souness left for Liverpool in ’91, Rangers not only were in safe hands with the baton handed over to Smith, but in fact were maybe even boosted by falling under his complete control.

In short, when Souness was out there on the pitch, Walter was the manager – and otherwise, it appears to have been a complete and equal team between the pair of them.

Walter was the master from day one in management, and Rangers were incredibly lucky to have him.