7 Nils Koppen Rangers TV interview takeaways as recruitment chief explains scout process and transfer plans
Yesterday at 12:44 PM
Nils Koppen has managed to keep himself out of the Rangers limelight since he arrived at the club.
But the director of football recruitment has finally spoken to Rangers TV to offer explanations on a number of key elements within the Ibrox corridors including the process of signing new players, his tight relationship with Philippe Clement as well as the club’s plans to tap into foreign, worldwide markets in future.
We at Rangers News picked out seven key takeaways from the Belgian’s sit-down with the official channels…
Reflecting on January and summer windows
“Yeah it’s been quite busy coming into a club of January this year. Directly rolling into a transfer window where you try to be active, it’s not the ideal scenario but we managed to do something and we’re happy with that.
“You then just keep on with preparation for the summer, in an ideal world you have a full season to prepare but that short space of time we knew what we wanted to do, had a lot of work to do, so I think we were quite active in the summer window. Not a lot of time to prepare but I’m quite happy with the end result.”
“Everyone was aware that the idea was to bring the average age down, getting more assets into the club was the basic philosophy. Some players left, we had to try and find replacements, it was 15 players leaving. That’s something you basically don’t want every season.
“The main thing was bringing in younger assets but don’t forget the balance of the squad and bringing in experience to help them. Looking back at the window I think we were quite ambitious. We had a plan in place with the board, the manager, it was an ambitious plan. Did we do everything we wanted to do? No. But I always think you have to set the bar high.
“You have to anticipate players leaving and using those funds to invest in players. It was the plan to constantly adjust during those months, but in the end doing 11 players coming in, (Nedim) Bajrami, Jefte, that’s the first steps to take us there so I’m quite happy with the squad and what we did this summer.”
Process of signing Rangers players
“There’s two big pillars we were looking at, first of all user network of your old team, and tips you get from agents. We want to be more scout and data driven so what we do is try to implement a lot of data sources, scan, filter them down, let our scouts have a look, so it’s like a pyramid and eventually hopefully the better name comes up to myself so I can have a look, go with the list to the manager.
“We can have open and honest discussions on the profiles he likes and eventually make a decision that we’re gonna have a talk with this target to try to get it over the line so he signs for Rangers.
“It takes 500,000 names down to 15 or 16, speaking to the manager and making a decision on it.”
Having a relationship with Clement
“It’s quite important. The starting point is you have to know the type of player a manager wants. You have to be aligned, it would be crazy me coming to him with players that don’t suit his style of play. We’re on the same page with what we want.
| Position | Team | PlayedMP | WonW | DrawnD | LostL | ForGF | AgainstGA | DiffGD | PointsPts |
| 1 | CelticCeltic | 7 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 22 | 1 | 21 | 21 |
| 2 | AberdeenAberdeen | 7 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 15 | 6 | 9 | 21 |
| 3 | RangersRangers | 7 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 12 | 4 | 8 | 16 |
| 4 | MotherwellMotherwell | 7 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 11 | 8 | 3 | 13 |
| 5 | Dundee UtdDundee Utd | 7 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 10 | 7 | 3 | 12 |
| 6 | ST MirrenST Mirren | 8 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 11 | 14 | -3 | 8 |
| 7 | Ross CountyRoss County | 8 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 8 | 14 | -6 | 7 |
| 8 | DundeeDundee | 7 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 12 | 14 | -2 | 6 |
| 9 | KilmarnockKilmarnock | 7 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 9 | 17 | -8 | 6 |
| 10 | HibernianHibernian | 7 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 11 | -5 | 5 |
| 11 | ST JohnstoneST Johnstone | 8 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 8 | 19 | -11 | 4 |
| 12 | Heart Of MidlothianHeart Of Midlothian | 8 | 0 | 2 | 6 | 6 | 15 | -9 | 2 |
“Do we always have the funds to go for the best players we want? No, so we have to be flexible. There’s constant talks and this is the first manager in my career who is quite open to watching a lot of players so that’s a big plus and help for me that he wants to know the players in detail.”
Tapping into unexplored markets
“It’s important to look all over the globe about where we can compete financially without losing the focus on Scotland and the local market. To look worldwide gives us more opportunities to sign these talents and I think football is going fast. The UK market is getting more difficult for us financially so we have to think outside the box and get creative.
“But also we have to look at profiles, even Brazil or Morocco that is more suitable, it’s about looking in the different market but finding suitable profiles.”
Player trading profile
“It’s a vital one and I come from a culture where it’s a yearly demand to sell someone to get funds back into the club.
“There was some examples with Rangers in the past the likes of Calvin Bassey. But it can’t be one in X amount of years it has to be something structural, that’s the most difficult thing. You have to have promotion from the academy, you have to buy players who come in to move on.
“It’s a big process to get it to every year you can sell, to use that money to buy the next big thing or the next big asset in your squad to get money in but also be competitive with every competition we play in.”
Player pathway
“I think it’s super important because the Scottish core should be strong. We can improve in that way and the academy is important. We’ve got some players coming through now and around the squad, our ambition should be getting more to actually play minutes and contribute an even bigger part of the team. That’s a big ambition we have.”
Transfer windows moving forward
“Last weekend we had a meeting with the manager and the football board, the board members, to determine the strategy about that.
“I think we’ve identified the positions at the moment we’re a little bit weak in, understaffed, maybe we need a bit more quality so we know that, we identified that.
“Now it’s about talking about budgets we can spend on that, going on the market and preparing ourselves for that window.
“On the other side there’s also the possibility that players will leave the club so we have to be ready to replace them where necessary. Again we’re working on that.
“The first step has been made and now the recruitment team is active to identify these positions.”
