John Brown reignites Rab Douglas row as Rangers legend vows they'll never speak again

Former Dundee boss John Brown insists he'll NEVER speak to Rab Douglas again after a bitter public fall-out.

The pair were embroiled in a toxic row back in 2013 when Steve Simonsen replaced ex-Celtic goalkeeper Douglas between the sticks at Dens Park. A war of words later erupted in the media as Douglas was placed on gardening leave and never played for the club again.

Rangers legend Brown later branded the shotstopper a "disrespectful liar" while Douglas vowed to "embarrass" his former manager by telling his side of the story in a book one day - claiming he had a tape record of the explosive meeting.

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Opening up on the bust-up on the Let Me Be Frank podcast with Parkhead idol Frank McAvennie and journalist Simon Houston, Brown swore: "I’ll never speak to him again."

Brown revealed he was taken aback by what Douglas said to him during their volatile meeting as he explained: "The physio and the doctor said he wouldn’t be available [for the next game]. Steve Simonsen signs. I brought Rab in on the Thursday morning to say, ‘Listen we’ve signed Steve Simonsen – you’ve been brilliant for me and as soon as you’re fit, you’re fighting with him for a place.'

"He called me a couple of things and I had to say, ‘Go and get your gear on, get out the building, you’ll never play for this club as long as I’m here again.' And it transpires that he was recording the conversation in my office. He was wanting to do a book. He had no permission to record anything. I don’t know what he was thinking about."

Despite their relationship now being broken beyond repair, Bomber admitted that Douglas was a top performer for him during his time at the Dees.

The 62-year-old said: "When he was on the pitch and he was fit, he did a great job for me. But I wouldn’t go into detail about what he said. By the way he’s a big lad! It’s sad it ended that way. I thought, ‘No, you want to speak to me like that then you’re not going to be in my team.’

"I couldn’t let him away with that. He had a great career down at Celtic, getting to a European final [when Celtic lost out on the Uefa Cup to Jose Mourinho’s Porto]. It was a sad one. He’s still loved by the Dundee support there too. But things happen in football.

"You either stand up and be counted… In my career I’ve never been spoken to like that and I’ve never heard another player speak to a manager like that."