Smith admits he was sacked by Rangers – and Advocaat was set to replace McLeish

WALTER Smith's confession that he was sacked as Rangers manager in 1998, a revelation he has kept to himself for ten years, was matched by his successor and Uefa Cup final counterpart Dick Advocaat yesterday when the Dutchman revealed he had been asked to return to Ibrox as manager three years ago.

Smith's exit after his first spell in charge was never fully explained, but he has at last admitted that he was shown the door to make way for Advocaat. "I was nicely sacked," Smith was able to say with a smile yesterday, as he looked ahead to leading Rangers to Manchester next week for the Uefa Cup final against Zenit St Petersburg.

Advocaat, for his part, was no less candid when he spoke about an approach from Rangers owner Sir David Murray in season 2005/06. The Zenit manager took over from Smith in 1998 but resigned in 2001 – a decision he now regrets – with Alex McLeish taking over at Rangers. When the McLeish reign started to unravel in 2005, Murray and Advocaat spoke about the possibility of a return as interim manager. However, Murray did not take up the option, and instead replaced McLeish with Paul Le Guen.

"There was something wrong at Rangers," said Advocaat. "But they decided to take another road."

Attention has focussed on the two managers in the build-up to next week's final, because Advocaat was brought to Rangers in the first place to improve on Smith's efforts in Europe, yet made only modest progress. McLeish and Le Guen fared little better, until Smith returned to steady the ship after the Le Guen appointment went badly wrong – and ended up taking Rangers to a first European final in 36 years in his first full season back in charge.

Smith yesterday revealed his admiration for the man who took over from him at Ibrox and says they are both equally determined to win the Uefa Cup. They met at Ibrox on Wednesday night, when Advocaat paid a visit to cast his eye over the Rangers team that his Russian side will face in Manchester.

The former Scotland manager said: "Dick is an outstanding coach and he has showed that everywhere he has gone. I don't need to speak for him, his own achievements speak for themselves.

"For someone to go to a foreign country, especially a country like Russia, must be very difficult but he has handled that extremely well.

"We had a good laugh after the Motherwell game talking about who wants to win the trophy more. I don't think there is much between us on that, nor will there be much between our teams on the night."

Meanwhile, Rangers could receive more than their original allocation of 13,000 tickets for the final after it emerged that Zenit have only sold 8,650 tickets. Uefa has still to confirm how any surplus tickets will be redistributed.