Rangers are looking to rebuild the Scottish core of the club by developing their own players and by bringing others in from elsewhere.
Nils Koppen will target Scots in every transfer window to join the likes of Connor Barron who signed last summer and Lyall Cameron, who will arrive at the end of his Dundee contract.
Improving the standard of player coming through the Rangers academy will be a priority, however, that will take time.
The aim won’t just be to take players from age group football to the first-team, it will be to sell them too.
Liam MacLeod never got to fulfill his potential with his performances for Rangers in Scotland’s lower leagues seeing then international manager Gordon Strachan talking up the midfielder’s chances.
What Gordon Strachan said about calling up Rangers starlet Lewis MacLeod
Called up for a qualifying game against the Republic of Ireland and a friendly with England, MacLeod’s inclusion saw the same inquiry that John McGinn faced over Lennon Miller.
Talking about why promoting young players was so important, Strachan used the current Scotland captain as the example to follow:
“If things go well this week you never know what might happen,’ said the former Celtic boss, via The Daily Mail.
“Young Andrew Robertson joined us for an afternoon and played against 11 versus 11 to work on certain things.
“After the game finished, I asked the coaches who played well and apart from Scott Brown and James Morrison, he was man of the match.
“I am looking forward to seeing him (Macleod) and working with him.
“I see him in the first game of the season and I caught up with videos and obviously other people watch games.
“So, it is easy to find out if a player is playing well. We think it will be good for us to have him along.”
What Rangers could learn from Strachan’s experiment
As Strachan learned with Robertson, whoever the next Rangers manager is must learn if Bailey Rice has what it takes to cope too.
The only true way of finding out if a young player has what it takes is by throwing them in at the deepend.
Barry Ferguson knows what it takes to cope with the pressure and with nothing on the line domestically, he should be giving more minutes to a talented individual who everyone seems to rate, but nobody has really trusted.
There couldn’t be a better time.
The games should have no pressure to perform on them other than the Europa League and there is a shortage of central midfielders.
Either side of the two games with Athletic Bilbao, players like Nicolas Raskin should be rested given the shift that they will need to put in.
After all, Rice impressed Rio Ferdinand and handled the pressure at Old Traffor, which suggests that he could handle anywhere.
