Gavin Rae will always regard his time in the light blue of Rangers as a story of what might have been.

The former Scotland midfielder, fondly remembered by fans of Dundee, Aberdeen and Cardiff City, saw two serious knee injuries bite two years out of his Ibrox career.

Yet he still played for Alex McLeish, Paul Le Guen and Walter Smith and he was at the centre of one of the most controversial episodes of Gers’ recent history.

Here in the closing instalment of a two-part Rangers Review interview Gavin reveals why he turned down Smith’s offer of a new deal to stay at Gers in the summer of 2007 – and never once regretted his decision.

Gavin Rae was torn, the master manager who he revered, the man who had handed him Scotland caps, wanted him to stay at Rangers.

Despite the two serious knee injuries that had bitten two full years out of his Ibrox, forget the fact that three and a half years in light blue had only brought the Scotland midfielder 35 games in Govan. 

Smith knew what he had in Rae the player and person. Someone he respected and could trust.

Yet at the age of 29 after all the heartache of a move haunted by misfortune Gavin knew he needed more than being someone Walter could rely on when called from the shadows.

Fit-again and at the peak of powers Rae said no to the deal and moved to Cardiff City in the English Championship.

Gavin reflected: “Walter awarded me Scotland caps when he was the national team boss, so we knew each other from that.

“And although I didn’t play too much for him at Rangers he was superb to me both as a player and a person.

“He showed me so much respect, he was an amazing man and a phenomenal manager.

“Walter offered me a new deal to stay but he had so many good midfielders and I knew other big signings were coming.

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“I just thought I needed a fresh start and I wanted to try something different in the English Championship.

“It was tough to say no to the deal because I knew I was leaving an amazing club having not truly made my mark, but I felt I had to go.

“I spoke to Norwich City and that deal got close but I opted for Cardiff City and by the end of that first season I had played 55 games and started in an FA Cup Final.

“After 35 games in three and a half years and all those injuries and setbacks it felt like I had made the right call.

“Mentally, I was back in a good place and playing every week again.

“That first season refreshed and reinvigorated me and I went on to have four good years at Cardiff.”

Now 45 and settled running his digital product consultancy firm in Sydney with Australian wife Barbara and soccer-daft twins Jacob and Gabriella, Gavin grew up in an era when the FA Cup Final was the game the world stopped to watch.

He knows his own appearance in one of football’s great occasions in 2008 will never be hailed as a classic but he couldn’t care less.

Gavin, who played in the 2003 Scottish Cup Final for Dundee against Rangers when Lorenzo Amoruso’s goal clinched a seventh domestic Treble, admitted: “Cardiff City v Portsmouth is not one of those FA Cup Finals you feel should ever happen!

“That season Barnsley had put out Liverpool and Chelsea and then we knocked them out in the semi-final, they did all the hard work for us so yeah, thanks Barnsley!

“Seriously, it was brilliant, we did go to Premiership Middlesbrough away from home and win but we didn’t really beat any giants apart from that.

“I had one of the best games of my life, though, in that semi-final against Barnsley in front of 82,000 fans at Wembley and Joe Ledley’s goal got us through.

“I remember my nerves that day and I knew then I’d be in the Final but Kanu scored for Portsmouth and they got the result.

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“People may say it was only Portsmouth but look at their line-up, their team was frightening!

“They had Pedro Mendes, Niko Kranjcar, Sulley Muntari, Sylvain Distin and David James in goal. It was stacked, outrageous. Wow, what a team that was.”

Gavin’s time at Rangers may be a story of promise unfulfilled but at Dundee, he is a Hall of Fame legend.

He is thrilled to see the Dens Park club back in the top flight and when Michael Beale’s side travel to Dens Park on November 1 to meet the newly-promoted Dark Blues there will be one fascinated fan of both clubs glued to a TV screen on the other side of the world.

Gavin admitted: “I am delighted that Dundee are back in the Premiership because for me it is a club that should be there, they add a lot.

“I’m also thrilled for Tony Docherty to get his first shot as the main man because we worked together briefly when he was Derek McInnes’ assistant at Aberdeen and he is a good football man.

“It was typical Dundee right enough, they win the league and the manager Gary Bowyer is gone the next day! 

“I went back five years ago and I was inducted into the Hall of Fame at Dens which is something I will always treasure after three spells and 303 games for the club.

“My last game for Dundee was in 2014 when we won the Championship to go back up into the Prem.

“I’m proud of what I did at that club and I actually scored a last-minute winner for the Dark Blues against Rangers.

“It was November 28, 1999, my 22nd birthday, and Steven Boyack who had played for Gers set me up for it.

“That was in the Dick Advocaat days against all the superstars and they had some team, Giovanni van Bronckhorst and the rest. They were phenomenal.”

Gavin’s Aussie wife Barbara spent 12 years in the United Kingdom supporting his career and the couple’s twins were born in Cardiff, South Wales.

Now New South Wales is home for the moment and the former Gers star’s focus is on his business life.

He stressed: “Ever since I came to Australia nine years ago I was either playing or coaching at the semi-professional part-time level.

“The last two years my kids are getting older and I am the taxi service to their football games and they are both doing well at a high level in the state so I have stepped away from coaching for now.

“After all the injury problems I had at Rangers the irony now is that my body is fine and I’m still playing over-35s and over-45s games!

“Like most Scots who leave home for pastures new I miss family the most and also the football landscape here is so different.

“Yes, the A-League is developing but I still watch all the English and Scottish games at ridiculous hours of the night to get that football buzz.

“Listen, even if it is the Grand Final here you will be 20 pages back before you get to the coverage in the paper.

“Rugby, Aussie Rules, cricket and so many other sports are so much bigger and that still takes a bit of getting used to.

“I coached in NPL1 with Hakoah Syndey City East FC which is the division beneath the A-League but I could never see myself getting that big breakthrough here.

“I am close with the former Aussie international Hayden Foxe – who is now assistant coach at Western United – and we agreed that I would be his no2 if he got a head coach role.

“He went for three high-profile gigs and didn’t get any of them and you start to wonder.

“I felt I had done well as a head coach myself and it was frustrating because I felt like I was getting nowhere.

“I have actually kept my UEFA A Licence up to date and I am doing my qualifications to become a football agent now just to keep my options open.

“I can still see myself going back to full-time at some point but I live in a country with just 11 full-time professional clubs.

“My passion is to be a manager or a head coach, I loved dealing with the board, the budgets and recruitment because I felt it suited my skillset.

“I miss matchdays so much, I can deal without the rest of it but I miss the games.

“I have worked in recruitment and technology before this and now I have my consultancy business helping clients with their digital products.

READ MORE: Inside a Rangers captaincy frenzy: Le Guen, Ferguson and Rae

“That could be working on projects like a new money app with the airline Qantas to financial services companies needing a new website.

“I enjoy it and I had to start from the bottom in business when I was 36 and I had hung up my boots.

“When I first came to Australia I worked in recruitment, project management and business analysis and I decided to treat it like football.

“I was on the same pay level as graduates, earning peanuts but I knew I had to learn.

“I did my apprenticeship, I picked up the phone and I educated myself. If I had stayed in the UK I am sure I would still be coaching.

“We chose to build our family life here, though I had an open mindset to what was next for me when I quit playing.”

There are certain players you meet as a journalist who you earmark as future coaches or football executives.

Rae was always one of those for me, a football thinker with a deep knowledge of the game who I felt had the empathy to collaborate with others and be a success.

I venture that it surprises me he is out of football for now and Gavin confesses: “I still love the game but it is tough in Australia to get the chances and the recognition you feel you deserve.

“They have a tournament here called the FFA Cup – which is like the FA Cup in England – and when I was in charge at Hakoah we reached the quarter-finals.

“That was the furthest any team outside of the professional division had reached and we played Melbourne City from the A-League.

“Now I’ve played in a Scottish Cup Final for Dundee and an FA Cup Final for Cardiff City and I know how journalists work.

“I was sitting waiting for the Gavin Rae Cup Memories piece but I never even got a mention!”

For now, it is Gavin’s company Product Rocket that is benefitting from his drive and ambition to better himself in whatever endeavour he faces.

I sense that football might not be finished with him yet, though, and I hope that whether it is as a Head Coach, a Sporting Director or an agent he will return. He has too much to offer not to.

For now, we sign off with one last glance back down Memory Lane to his days in the Dark Blue of Scotland.

He smiles: “My sense of pride now that I am finished first of all is that I got to over 500 professional games and almost 20 years in the game as a player.

“With Scotland I started with Craig Brown then I had Walter Smith, George Burley and Berti Vogts.

“So I got through a few bosses to earn those 14 caps! Listen, I remember one European Championships qualifier against Lithuania at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon at Hampden.

“The place was rocking, my family were all there and a young Darren Fletcher came on and scored a late winner for us to seal a crucial 1-0 win.

“I remember looking around, trying to soak it all in and thinking this is what I had dreamed about as a kid. That’s a cool thing to look back on.”