MATT GILKS could have ended up on the scrapheap if it wasn’t for some words of advice from his mother.

Now he is determined to get motoring with Rangers before he swaps his gloves and team-mates for a spanner and weekends at the racetrack with his friends.

The keeper became Mark Warburton’s seventh signing of the summer when he agreed a deal at Ibrox last week but the dream move would never have become a reality if he hadn’t been talked round four years ago.

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Disillusioned with life at Blackpool and out of favour with manager Simon Grayson, Gilks decided enough was enough one day and was ready to throw in the towel.Glasgow Times: DEPARTURE: Matt Gilks has signed a two-year contract with Rangers

Within months, he was playing in the Premier League and now the 34-year-old has a chance to make an impression north of the border in the twilight of his career. It was so nearly a story of what might have been, though.

“My mum Susan said ‘what else are you going to do, you’ve been doing this for so long why are going to chuck it in?’ She talked a bit of sense in to me,” Gilks said.

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“It doesn’t matter what age you are you can always get them kind of advice from your mother! She told me it would come good again and the next year it did.

“Ian Holloway came in but I was that desperate to get away that after he did his introductory speech I didn’t get changed and I went up to him and said ‘It was nice to meet you and I wish you well but I need to get off. I’m going to speak to another club with my agent’.

“He said I wasn’t going anywhere because he didn’t even know me and he wasn’t going to let me go. Then 14 games into the season he put me and I was playing for Blackpool so that was another decision that went my way.”Glasgow Times: TARGET: Hearts are interested in signing Burnley goalkeeper Matt Gilks

Having turned his career around, Gilks now has a chance to finish it in style. He has rediscovered his love for the game, but another has never left him.

A hobby would almost become a full-time job. If he had brought the flag down on football, a new career would have got the green light.

“I would probably have gone into mechanics. I was pretty handy with a spanner,” Gilks said.

“My mates are all into banger racing and I could throw engines in and out of cars without a problem so I would probably have gone banger racing with them. I still go watching them now. I have travelled all over watching them.

“My best mate and I used to keep a hot-rod in my mum’s garage. We used to work on it in the garage and he would race on a Sunday.

“My brother came over from Boston two weeks ago and we were clearing out the garage and we found two engines in bits. There were all these parts and starter motor and manifolds in there.

“We used to go to Buxton and Bellevue, the greyhound stadium, but I have been all over.

“When I went to Norwich I used to go and watch it on my own at Great Yarmouth and a couple of other tracks. Every year we go down to Hednesford for what they call the civil war because it’s north v south.Glasgow Times:

“I love it. If my mates are still doing it when I retire then I will do it. I don’t think my missus will appreciate a banger in the driveway though.

“Last Bonfire Night I went to watch my mate at Bellevue and I said to my missus that I wouldn’t get involved. But I ended up under the car in the mud in my normal clothes trying to put a drive shaft back in the gear box.”

With a Premiership title race to look forward to next term, Gilks will have to park his racing ambitions for now.

He may have been signed as back-up to Wes Foderingham, but he has his sights set on the Gers jersey.

It was keeper coach Jim Stewart who brought Gilks on board at Ibrox and the former Scotland internationalist now has plans in place for after he crosses the finishing line.

“Although, I didn’t play at Burnley I left there feeling as fit as I have ever been and my body fat was as low as it has ever been,” he said. “I think I have got a good four years in me and maybe even play to 40.

“I want to play as long as I can and I have just been to Belfast to do my UEFA B and half of my A so coaching is on my mind for when I do finish.

“And with big Jim I can do the goalkeeping ones at Rangers. So I’m looking to go down that route.”