Nils Koppen has revealed Rangers could recruit former Ibrox players to help develop academy prospects.
The new technical director has explained his plan to aid development by adding former professionals with experience of the process at Rangers.
Koppen's new role - which he will undertake alongside carrying out strategic transfer decisions - will see him oversee the club academy.
And he has quickly set out the vision for further progression in the youth side with starlets moving on to the first-team, with adding former professionals to the set-up an early idea.
Koppen told Rangers TV: "One of the things where I'm looking at is maybe adding in some ex-professional Rangers players to increase that level of DNA to that level of detail, players that are in this building be a part of it that know what's about that's something what's going to be key in the years to come."
Read more:
-
Rangers confirm Nils Koppen appointed technical director alongside transfer role
-
Rangers ace Dessers handed lifeline in bid to end international exile
On the academy, Koppen added: "I think first of all we have to fill in the key positions within the academy to ensure that we'll be ready for the future.
"We can be a productive academy by bringing players through to the first team. I think there's a lot of good work to be done already in the last years within the academy but we cannot be satisfied with the general output of the academy. What we still have to improve or we still have to make steps in.
"We have to keep on creating room for our own academy players to make the step to the first team and we can do that by a better squad build up for the first team to roster them into the first team to give them the opportunity to step up and be a part of that.
"I think one of the objectives still will be to sign the best talents of Scotland to maintain our best talents because I'm sure we've got a lot of good talents already in the building.
"We're facing a challenge with the B Team where there's not an ideal platform so it's on us to try to get the best challenges and opportunities for the boys in our club. What we want to do is decrease age to make a step to the first team to make their breakthrough.
"We want to do that by strategic partnerships with other clubs by changing our own philosophy, by bringing the players on a younger age expose them to the first team training environment to give them the opportunity to show themselves and make the right steps at the right moment.
"I think what we also don't have to forget is that we're a Scottish club we have to educate players not only for our first team but also in general for the Scottish game. Something what we have to pay more attention on, that the output also if they cannot make it up here as a pro that they will be able to be a professional football player in the Scottish highest level and we really have to improve that.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel