Kwame Poku to Rangers transfer link gets firm answer from Peterborough boss

Peterborough boss Darren Ferguson has warned Rangers that star man Kwame Poku isn't for sale in January.

Poku, 23, has lit up EFL League One this season with 10 goals in 15 games and netted a hat-trick in the 6-1 demolition of Cambridge United just before the international break. The ex-Colchester United star is in his fourth season with the Posh but is out of contract next summer. Peterborough are desperate to keep hold of the electric winger but have yet to tie him down on a new deal.

It's understood several English teams are keepings tabs on Poku's situation and Gers have also been linked with a pre-contract swoop. Ferguson - the son of Sir Alex - is adamant his goalscoring attacker won't leave in the January window but revealed the club does have a contingency plan should he depart at the end of the campaign.

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Speaking to Posh +, he said: “We’ve had speculation about our players in all my time here. And I see it as a good thing because if no-one is talking about your players it means you’re not doing very well as a team. That speculation is only going to crank up in January and clearly I will have to manage the situation regarding certain players.

"I don’t think anything will happen with Kwame (Poku). We have a safety net with him and with Ricky (Jade Jones) as we would get compensation for both of them given their ages. I never go mad with signings in January, but we will look to recruit one player in one position and that will also depend on one other thing happening."

Rangers could take advantage of the cross-border compensation rules by landing Poku for a six-figure sum at the end of his deal. Gers have used the loophole to their benefit in previous years, saving millions by plucking Joe Aribo from Charlton and Calvin Bassey from Leicester City. That would be a nightmare scenario for Peterborough owner Darragh MacAnthony who, in an interview with the Hard Truth podcast, has slapped a £6million price tag on the head of the club's biggest asset.

He said: “(Tribunals will) look at a lot of things. They’ll look at how long he’s been with you? He’ll have been with us four years, he’ll have played probably 200 games, we’d have paid nearly £500k in add-ons already. They’ll look at the offers we’ve had. So we’ll be able to straight away go into the tribunal and show them offers from six months ago that were of the value of three-and-three, £3m up front and £3m in add-ons (£6m in total).

"We will expect minimum that plus, plus, plus and plus. A fair tribunal will look and go ‘yeah, you’ve spent £500k, you’ve developed him’ and the club that is trying to sign him they’ll look at it and go ‘that’s a big club with money, you’re going to have to pay whatever’. So that’s how they would value that.

"(The fact we’ve made him a big offer) plays into it to. We’d expect the tribunal to be very fair to not discourage clubs from being in that situation when you get richer clubs coming in and to make them pay a fair price."