Where has all Rangers money gone? Alarming £17m loss in club accounts uncovered

The Rangers board are facing yet more scrutiny from supporters after the club revealed an operating loss of £17.2million in the most recent financial year.

The Glasgow giants have published their annual accounts and accompanying financial statement and that deficit makes for bad reading, despite the club also saying they have recorded record figures in core revenue of £88.3m. But operating costs at Ibrox remain as high as £110m, with staff costs accounting for £61m of that total figure.

So when you factor in the £20million-plus the club received for Calvin Bassey, as well as the fees for the likes of Joe Aribo, a run to the Europa League Final plus participation in the Champions League groups, some punters are asking just where has all that money gone.

Record Sport's expert pair of Scott McDermott and Scott Burns joined Daniel Caw on the latest edition of Hotline Live to dissect the reasons behind the alarming figures, and the key point of the discussion revolved around Rangers failure in their player trading model. The Light Blues invested heavily in their squad after reaching the final of the Europa Leaguein 2022, only to sack manager Giovanni van Bronckhorst six months later in the wake of a poor start to the Premiership season and off the back of some dismal results in the group stages of the Champions League.

And Scott Burns reckons Tuesday's report is a reflection of that heavy spending policy and huge turnover of players in the squad. He said: "They have obviously brought in a lot of players on big money, in terms of what Rangers spend. After the European run they invested heavily and put the wages up significantly, and now they can no longer afford to run at those levels. That's why Philippe Clement has had to