Nils Koppen has spoken for the first time following his appointment as technical director at Rangers. Here is every word he had to say to RangersTV.

What does it mean firstly to be taking on such a role and can you explain exactly what this role entails?

It's a big honour for myself, it's a challenge that I'm ready for, I'm really looking forward to. It's about getting all the support behind the scenes at the highest level possible, the support of men's first team to achieve their objective and their goals, in the end try to be a winning Rangers on the park. It's about creating an environment where accountability, quality and togetherness are key moving forward. It's about pushing people to get the best out of themselves and frankly to deliver within their domain and in the end with the ultimate goal to be a winning Rangers on the park because winning is all that matters in this club.

What does this mean for the club's recruitment department and the overall recruitment strategy going forward? 

I think the building blocks for the recruitment department are already in place and to be honest I'm still going to be very close to that recruitment department because I think I consider it as one of my key responsibilities within my new role to be a part of that very important strategic pillar that recruitment and player training is in the club and we have to get better and we have to keep on improving on that way. So for the short term there's not going to be a lot of changes within the department. I'm not excluding it's not going to happen in the mid-long term down the road but I'm quite positive about the quality of my department, the structure what we have in place, what we restructured a couple of months ago. So all my confidence in these guys and I will stay very close to it. I think everything is on the way to prepare for the January window. I'm still going to be a big part of that. So yeah, for the moment not going to change the structure of the department.

What will be key to the future success of the academy here?

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. 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.

And of course you'll be working closely with the first team manager how crucial will your relationship be with him?

That relationship will remain key. I think throughout the last months we had an open and positive relationship where there was room for myself to just discuss everything that was necessary so that's going to that's going to stay key. It's my job to take away all the tasks around the team so that the manager mainly can focus on the team and on the park to get the best possible results.

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When you look at the staff that you're taking on here does it give you real hope of making Rangers successful in the years to come?

I mean nearly a year inside of this club and had the time to observe a lot of processes and people inside of the football department. I must say there's a lot of good people within this department but also a lot of areas that we have to improve, have to address on the short term and I think there will be some changes in the coming period, but all with the idea to strengthen the department and making the next steps. Because for me it's crucial that the team around the team has to be on the highest level to let our team perform on the park to get the best possible results.

What will be some of your first priorities in your new role?

It's about continuing the work towards January window, what's quite an important one for the first team. It's about ensuring the stability in the football department and I think as a very important one making key decisions within the academy to get the right structure in place. As I mentioned before this is a very unique place so by bringing people back with the Rangers background we know what it's about. I think it's a quite crucial one moving forward.