Barry Ferguson has admitted that his career at Rangers ended due to his own mistake.
The former Ibrox captain was suspended and stripped of the captaincy in 2009 before being allowed to return for the final league game and Scottish Cup final. He then left for Birmingham City that summer.
Speaking on The Warm-Up, Ferguson said: "I had finished my Rangers career; I had ballsed up. I had no one else to blame but myself. That’s my biggest regret in my career.
"I wanted to finish my career at Rangers."
At the age of 31, Ferguson had hoped to remain at Ibrox, earn a testimonial and start coaching within the youth system. He added: "It ended the way I didn’t want it to end, but through nobody else’s fault but my own. Rangers made the decision, and rightly so, they suspended me.
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"To be fair to Walter, he didn’t have to bring me in towards the end of the season. He brought me in for the last day of the season and allowed me to lift the trophy with David Weir, then the Scottish Cup final the week after, then I knew my time was up."
Ferguson said the fallout affected his options when he left Rangers, with clubs reluctant to take a chance on him. He said: "It hurt me because I thought I might not get a club here. But I’m not going to blame anyone else here. It was up to me.
“I still had a lot of football in me. I was only 31, 32 at that stage. I was a bad person then.
"I had to go away and reinvent myself.”