Rip it up and start again? Well, not quite but the restructuring of the Scottish football league system is a topic that simply won’t go away. By all accounts, the domestic game needs a bigger facelift than the Great Sphinx of Giza.

Having suffered his first competitive defeat as Rangers manager during the midweek Scottish League Cup tie with St Johnstone, Mark Warburton was given a full-blown taste of the fickle nature of the footballing culture north of the Border as a fevered media went from gushing adoration to finger-pointing cynicism before you could say “well, that’s the honeymoon over”.

Prior to the 3-1 loss at Ibrox, Warburton insisted that there was not much of gap in quality between his Rangers side and the teams competing a division higher in the Scottish Premiership. In the wake of that defeat, Warburton stuck by his guns and maintained that championship clubs have plenty of clout. That was backed up by wins for Morton and Hibernian over Premiership teams during those League Cup encounters.

What all of this inevitably led to was a blether about league expansion to a top-flight of 16, a development which Warburton is very much in favour of. Why, the Englishman even hinted that he would sacrifice two matches each season against Old Firm rivals Celtic if it had a galvanising effect on the national game in the wider sense. Teams playing each other four times in the league, and perhaps meeting each other two more times in various cups, can become as bland and unpalatable as an unbuttered cream cracker. On the other side of the coin, there is the financial hit of two home games less against the big crowd pullers.

As a former city trader, though, Warburton knows a fair bit about profit and loss. “I’m looking from a football perspective but some short-term pain for long-term gain could be a very relevant quote here,” said the 53-year-old ahead of his side’s Championship encounter with Morton at Cappielow today.

“I’m sure Rangers going away and taking seven or eight thousand supporters to a game is an injection of cash which is much needed and clubs might lose that for one game, but I’m sure in the longer term the health of Scottish football would be better and we would see some investment coming in. Should we expand the league? I’m sure it’s an idea that will come up. I’m just speaking as a guy who’s come into Scottish football this season, I’m not speaking as an expert. Playing teams that often – apart from the obvious one with the excitement of the Old Firm derby – is overkill sometimes. All I hear about is the gulf between here and down south. I mean £100 million for coming last in the Premier League? The numbers are mind-boggling. Look at the transfer market this summer and the teams bidding £6m, £7m, up to £10m for a player in the Championship.

“Where would Celtic’s budget sit in the English Championship? I don’t know. 10th maybe? That tells you that we – as in Scottish football – have to move as quickly as possible to solve that problem, because there are obviously problems there.

“How many years ago was it that Rangers and Celtic were in the top-five payers in British football? It must be in the last 20 years. The change has been staggering. And everyone is talking about it, but no action is being taken. The gap is only going to get bigger. There’s a lot of talk but we have to find a way of making the product more attractive because the investment has to increase to allow Scottish football to close the gap on England. We need to explore options and anyone involved in the process has to look at what’s best for the long-term picture. If it’s always about short-term fixes you’re never going to make significant progress.”

Warburton’s men have certainly been making progress in the Championship with seven wins out of seven and will face a tricky tussle with a Morton side buoyed by League Cup success over Motherwell. While much was made of the St Johnstone defeat, the Rangers manager is not one to be affected by hysterical, knee-jerk reaction. “The players involved have been outstanding, we just had a bad night on Tuesday,” he said.

Cliches remain but, on league reconstruction, Warburton is a man for change.