McCoist: Rangers will be kicking themselves after deal agreed for striker

Ally McCoist has claimed that Rangers will be kicking themselves for failing to sign Louis Moult from Motherwell.

It was confirmed on Thursday that Moult, 25, would be leaving Fir Park in January after agreeing a deal to join English Championship side Preston for a widely reported fee of £450,000.

The Scottish Sun has previously reported that the Light Blues were in pursuit of Moult, but had decided to cool their interest ahead of the January transfer window.

Now, McCoist has claimed that he was shocked that the Gers decided not to try harder to sign the Motherwell goal machine.

"Well if it was Rangers I'd be kicking myself for the last 12 months," he said on BT Sport 1's Scottish Football Extra on Saturday morning.

"I can understand why they haven't got them now because they haven't got a manager to make that decision.

"It's a strange one because he's clearly, out of Celtic, one of the better centre-forwards in Scotland. Some of his goals have been absolute top class.

"It surprises me, it really surprises me. It doesn't surprise me as much now because the finances might dictate that he has to go south."

Moult has been in fine form for Motherwell this season, scoring 14 goals in 22 appearances across all competitions, two of which came against Rangers in the Scottish League Cup semi-final at Hampden Park in October.

The English forward is nearing the end of his contract at Fir Park though and the general consensus is that Motherwell have done well to get a decent fee for someone who could have left for nothing at the end of the campaign.

He will join Preston when the January transfer window opens in just a couple of weeks' time but will have a tough task of breaking into the first-team due to the fine form of Jordan Hugill.

In other Rangers news, former Celtic striker Chris Sutton has been left baffled by this "odd" Gers transfer decision.

We’ve launched a << BREAKING NEWS FEED>> exclusively for your club. ‘Like Us’ on Facebook by clicking here if you want 24/7 updates on all Rangers breaking news.