HAMZA IGAMANE refused to come on for Rangers at St Mirren after claiming he was injured.
But Ally McCoist reckons the club should be throwing the book at the striker – IF that wasn’t the case.
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Rangers were held to a third consecutive 1-1 draw to start their Scottish Premiership campaign, this time by St Mirren.
Russell Martin needed a late strike from 18-year old Findlay Curtis to rescue a point in Paisley but he’s still looking for his first league win as boss.
The result means Martin has won just three of his nine games in charge – no permanent Rangers manager has had a worse record than that.
Martin’s cause wasn’t helped by Hamza Igamane.
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Eyebrows were raised when the Gers boss used all five subs, with Moroccan frontman Igamane NOT one of those sent on despite the glaring need for a goal.
Unsurprisingly, he was quizzed on the striker – who’s been the subject of major interest from French club Lille this summer – after the game.
Martin then dropped the bombshell that Igamane had REFUSED to come on as a sub – claiming he’d picked up an injury.
The under-fire Gers boss said: “We wanted to bring him on around 60 minutes and he said he had a sore quad so he couldn’t go on.
“He wouldn’t have been on the bench if he wasn’t fit. He said he’d done it warming up.
“I have to trust him so we’ll assess his injury, hope it’s not too bad and we’ll see what happens.
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“We turned down a bid for him this week.
“But as a human being I have to trust that he’s done it in the warm-up like he says.”
While Martin has little choice but to accept Igamane’s claims at face value, pundits Kris Boyd and Chris Sutton weren’t so sure.
Speaking on Sky Sports after the game, former Rangers striker Boyd said: “If he’s injured, he’s injured. I highly doubt it though.”
Celtic hero Sutton said the club should “kick (Igamane) out.”
Those sentiments were shared by Ibrox great Ally McCoist.
While the Gers icon says there’s always the possibility of picking up an injury during the warm-up, McCoist reckons the Igamane situation appeared “very, very strange.”
The striking legend called on the club to throw the book at Igamane IF they’re able to prove he wasn’t injured – something he concedes would be very difficult to do.
McCoist told talkSPORT Breakfast: “I think the lad wants away regardless of Russell Martin’s approach to his job, to be honest with you.
“It’s a tough one because we’ve all got an opinion of it but effectively we don’t know.
“If he says he’s injured himself in the warm-up, there’s not a lot you can do about it, right?
“I find it very, very strange at that particular time.
“I’m talking to you as a man that has effectively injured himself in the warm-up of a cup final and had to pull out so it can happen.
“It can happen but there’s just something not right about it.
“See if he’s not injured, you fine him as much as you can.
“It’s appalling, if – IF – he is fit to play and has said he’s injured I’m not going on, that’s diabolical to tell you the truth, it’s absolutely diabolical.
“But it’s a very difficult thing to prove.
“The lad might have injured himself in the warm-up, I’ve done it myself, so it is possible.
“But you can tell he wants away.”
McCoist also tore into a Rangers team that has failed to pick up any steam this season.
They’ve dropped six points from nine already this season and trail Celtic by six points heading into this weekend’s Old Firm clash at Ibrox.
Taking no prisoners, McCoist took aim at the current Gers crop, branding them ‘weak’ and ‘soft.’
He continued “He (Martin) is getting on thin ice of course he is, there’s no doubt about it.
“I’ve got to be honest again, St Mirren more than deserved a point but that wasn’t a surprise, Stephen Robinson‘s doing a fabulous job.
“Rangers look soft, they rook really soft, they look weak physically, they look weak mentally, they’ve got nothing about them.
“There’s big, big problems there.
“There’s a lot of it not Russell Martin’s fault but we know where the buck stops, as always, it’ll stop at the manager’s door.
“But there’s a lot of the problems that are not his fault.
“All of them, he’s going to have to deal with but whether he can deal with it quick enough, time till tell. I hope he does.”
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