This time last year Nils Koppen arrived at Ibrox to complete a seven-man football board. One year on, the executive set-up at Rangers has changed dramatically with scope for further additions. 

Yesterday’s news that Koppen has been appointed Rangers’ technical director, moving up from the role of director of football recruitment, is the latest in a long line of upheaval amongst leadership positions and the overall executive structure in recent years. 

The two men who formed the football board and made significant staff changes in 2023, ex-CEO James Bisgrove and chairman John Bennett, are no longer in position. Creag Robertson has left as head of football operations and only last month did Rangers announce David McCallum’s temporary role as academy director following Zeb Jacobs’ departure before summer. Aside from the club doctor Mark Waller, Philippe Clement is now the longest surviving member of the football board established last winter, having been in post for little over a year.

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For some supporters the news of Koppen’s new title is viewed as the latest case of internal promotion at a club craving strong, experienced leadership - another option taken inside the building where the board seem more comfortable looking than externally. While the appointment of a chairman is believed to be imminent and the target of Christmas previously set for a CEO announcement, John Gilligan continues to fulfil an interim role at the top of the club.

However, talks between Koppen and club chiefs regarding the jurisdiction of his role trend back to Bennett’s time as chairman. In his first public interview last month, Koppen told the Rangers Review he was “surprised at some aspects of the situation” after assuming his role in Glasgow. Nobody can deny the chaos that has gradually engulfed Rangers following their place in a European final two-and-a-half years ago. With so many consistent changes those accountable for the current situation, at an executive level, have often left the building and others to account for their decisions. 

Koppen’s job remit was to fix a broken player-trading model, remodel a wage bill that had been allowed to run out of control and restructure the recruitment department. In particular, sources involved in the hiring process suggest that the 39-year-old’s various roles at PSV and particular focus on signing young players ready for the first-team attracted Rangers to appoint him. 

The Rangers Review understands there was some disconnect between the role Koppen signed up to and the responsibilities it entailed upon arrival. It cannot be denied a move to technical director ensures more responsibility and scope, but there is also an element of realigning expectations. A recruitment philosophy should, in theory, feed into every club department, not least the academy, which has produced players but rarely pathways in past seasons. As such the responsibility for establishing that philosophy is required across departments. 

(Image: Rob Casey - SNS Group) Koppen will now have increased say and responsibility for topics such as academy contracts, the pathway to the first-team and helping form a ‘Rangers DNA’ that’s already been established in the recruitment department. His appointment as technical director should also provide stronger connection between the analysis, performance and recruitment departments behind the scenes at the training centre. 

Tellingly, when Koppen was asked about immediate priorities he spoke of an ambition to bring ex-players back into the youth set-up at Ibrox, saying: “I’m looking to add some ex-Rangers players to increase that level of DNA and detail… this is a very unique place so bringing people back with a Rangers background, I think it’s quite crucial moving forwards". This is viewed as a good example of the type of decision Koppen’s increased role entails.

It’s important to remember that the biggest part of any football executive job is normally transfers and already, this is an area Koppen leads on. It is not a simple case of the Belgian presenting players to Clement and making calls in isolation. However, the manager’s role in watching players only comes into play towards the end of a long, extensive process. All to say, while it is a cliché to suggest a club ‘cannot afford to give a manager another window’, Rangers are not signing players that Clement has identified and led on bringing to the club.

As aforementioned, it is important to stress that internal promotion, even when there is nuance to that phrase, has rarely worked at Ibrox in recent seasons. Koppen has remained hands-on in the recruitment process until this point, a structure previously explained at length to the Rangers Review. It remains to be seen to what extent new tasks take him away from leading a department that has undergone significant change in the past year.

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One important detail included in the news released by Rangers yesterday was the fact that Koppen, Clement and Donald Gilles, Rangers women’s football managing director, will all report under the club’s new CEO. The technical director role assumed by Koppen does not hand him jurisdiction over the hiring and firing of a manager, it is not an all-powerful sporting director role that affords him total ownership over footballing strategy.

Indeed, it is understood that a further football executive addition at the club is not off the table. There is a belief that the incoming CEO’s own credentials will be assessed before potentially appointing another senior football figure at Ibrox, with Koppen’s appointment viewed as a ‘middle step’ towards further change in structure. Sources suggest it's not improbable that if Rangers' new CEO does not possess a sporting background, they could look to fill that void externally.

An accepted oversight by some in the building has been the lack of footballing continuity above a manager. Too often the core football ideas have flowed from the dugout - the issue being they’ve changed every autumn since 2021. A club’s playing and recruitment DNA simply cannot afford to deviate as dramatically as Rangers’ has. It devalues players, stunts development and years of work in an academy system designed towards a certain style.

Bennett and Bisgrove drove an executive structure that moved away from an ‘overarching’ sporting director following Ross Wilson’s departure to Nottingham Forest in April 2023. The driving force was a plan to fix recruitment and a player-trading model that had delivered only sporadic wins.

(Image: Rob Casey - SNS Group)

The theory of increasing departmental responsibility and the number of decision-makers around the table was sound, but in practice the lack of a sporting director, or more accurately, a CEO with a sporting director background to own overall football strategy above the manager was a costly oversight, especially in the summer window of 2023. 

Presently, there is a lack of personnel at an executive level who possess the football knowledge and expertise to accurately judge Clement’s performance and safeguard future managerial appointments. 

There is a reason that most clubs in world football do not entrust transfer business to managers and accept the need for tried and tested football insight at an executive level. Like player recruitment, a deep and nuanced view of football should be held by those making the most important decision of all - who is the manager, and for how long?

When Koppen was explaining to the Rangers Review why he retains a hands-on approach to scouting recently, he said: “If you're not able to keep up on the developments on the pitch, and you have to make a decision on a player, for me you enter a tricky zone.”

Could that not be translated to, on the topic of a CEO making a managerial appointment, If you're not able to keep up on the developments on the pitch, and you have to make a decision on a manager, you enter a tricky zone? That is the issue still unsolved at Ibrox that must be addressed sooner rather than later.