Ally McCoist slams UEFA in new Rangers rant live on talkSPORT

Ally McCoist has fumed at UEFA after suggesting it is now impossible for the likes of Rangers and Celtic to compete in the Champions League as only a select few clubs have the finances to win it.

In a discussion surrounding whether the Champions League has become stale due to the same clubs competing to win it each year, the Rangers legend pointed to the likes of Porto, Marseille and Red Star Belgrade who have all made finals.

McCoist claimed that is now impossible, with the financial gap too wide as shown by Rangers and Celtic’s struggles in the group stage, and that gap is only likely to get wider.

Speaking to talkSPORT [08:14], McCoist ranted: “Rangers and Celtic already find it, if not impossible, unbelievably difficult to compete in the group stages. A lot of that, the vast majority, is down to finance.

“I think the problem that I have with it is it’s just going to keep going until there will be only three or four clubs capable of winning it, and the three or four clubs are the richest clubs in Europe.”

Ally McCoist claims Rangers cannot compete in the Champions League

McCoist is right, it has become impossible for clubs like the Old Firm sides to compete in UEFA competitions due to the finances involved for the likes of Manchester City, Real Madrid, PSG and Bayern Munich.

The phrase ‘The rich get richer’ is thrown around a lot in football, but it is perhaps most prevalent when discussing the Champions League. The money from UEFA tournaments is crucial to clubs like Rangers and Celtic, but they never get far enough to truly reap those rewards.

Manchester City, meanwhile, expect to go the whole way through the tournament every year, and the further they get, the more money they get. That money goes back into the team, and then the process starts again.

With the money involved in the biggest European clubs, that gap continues to grow between those at the top and the hopeful clubs at the bottom of that chain, with no respite from that likely to emerge despite reforms to the Champions League format.