Man on, Nedim: What future holds for Rangers' coach - and why he's prepared to go back to sofa if required

The sharp-eyed will have seen Neil McCann make an unscripted appearance in an excellent short film released by Rangers earlier this week detailing how it feels to be a professional footballer during Ramadan.

About halfway through the six-minute-long production, with the camera fixed on Nedim Bajrami during a rondo drill, McCann suddenly flies into the frame while making a full-blooded challenge on the Albanian. It isn't quite James Tarkowski on Alexis Mac Allister in Tuesday's Merseyside derby levels of full-blooded, but it looks tasty all the same.

While it was all smiles and backslaps afterwards, it perhaps helps illustrate why many Rangers fans felt so-called Rangers men were required back in the building as quickly as possible.

While it was enjoyable to hear McCann speak for the first time since answering the call to become one of interim manager Barry Ferguson’s assistants, this clip was every bit as eloquent when it comes to summing up the new sense of zest introduced by the incoming management team.

McCann is clearly loving life back at what he terms “the coalface”. The 50-year-old is happy to refer to Ferguson, three years his junior and, some might argue, a less obvious character to fit the bill of Rangers manager, as “the gaffer”, which he does a number of times when meeting the press prior to this Saturday’s Premiership fixture against Hibs.

McCann relived the moment Ferguson phoned him to ask if he was interested in leaving the Sportscene sofa and assorted other punditry seats to join his staff. It was, he says, “surprising” to hear from his former teammate after Philippe Clement’s reign had been terminated following a dire 2-0 home defeat against St Mirren.

Early starts, late finishes at Rangers

“I didn't expect it to be coming,” McCann emphasises. “And then of course the question, when I got a phone call on Monday from the club, asking would you be interested... clearly there's an excitement there. It's not an opportunity I thought was going to come but I couldn't wait. I literally couldn't wait to get into work. It's been like that since the start. It's early starts, it's late finishes but it's so good.”

It's also nerve-shredding nights in the Sukru Saracoglu stadium in Istanbul, standing just yards away from Jose Mourinho. It’s rollercoaster rides such as coming back from two goals down against Kilmarnock in the very first game to win 4-2. It’s coming back twice from two-goal deficits against Dundee to win 4-3 in time added on at a venue where he made the breakthrough as a professional footballer.

It’s seeing Rangers throw away a two-goal aggregate lead against Fenerbahce and then watching – or not watching – them reach the Europa League quarter-finals via a penalty shootout. And this is before even mentioning a first victory at Parkhead for five years earned by a late winner having been pegged back to 2-2.

All of this begs the question: how can McCann possibly countenance slipping back into a slim-fit shirt and returning to a studio to simply talk about football? Live television is far from easy and will trigger its own endorphins. However, it would appear to be a poor substitute for the thrill of being as close to the action as McCann in recent weeks at a club he clearly has such deep feelings for.

He explains that he’s already accepted that it might simply be a short-lived affair. He’s simply happy to have had the chance to contribute at the club again.

“I love the whole strategy and management,” he says. “I've loved my time already and being part of Rangers is something I'm very proud of. I was a player and now I’ve been given the chance to come back and put the badge back on again as part of the coaching team. But if I need to go back to punditry, I'll give it 100% as well.”

Of course, he’s switched back and forth between such roles before. Indeed, he’s almost earning a reputation as the go-to man for football repair jobs. “Every footballer will probably tell you... well, maybe not every footballer because a lot of people actually don't want to have a go at this. But I love it," he says. "There's nothing better than being on a touchline, on a training ground, preparing for a game. There's nothing better.

Staying in the moment

“I loved my time at Dundee. I loved my time at Inverness. It's taken a different avenue afterwards. I haven't looked any further forward.

“You can't because the contract (until the end of the season) is the contract. We're in here to do a job. As I've said, we're working very, very hard at it.

“What we're charged with is making improvements to the group, making improvements to the individuals, getting the fans back seeing a team that is really, really fine, showing all the qualities you have to have as a Rangers player.”

And McCann, like fellow coaches Billy Dodds, Allan McGregor and, of course, Ferguson, knows all about that. “The whole DNA of this club has not been lost on the four of us coming in, certainly,” he says. “That's something the players have embraced. They really have embraced it. Whether they take it all on board is another thing, but we have to keep hammering that home and equally try to make them better footballers.”

Injecting some life into them was, though, the immediate priority. It paid instant dividends against Kilmarnock, in Ferguson’s first match in charge. It has continued to provide reward too, including on Saturday night against Dundee. McCann was a fleet-footed, skilful winger in his day but he knew how to mix it, as did Ferguson, Dodds and McGregor.

“We've all heard stories in the past of what was going on in the background,” McCann continues. “And actually, when I'm doing my punditry stuff watching the team, I just felt that, maybe towards the latter end of Philippe's tenure, the group lacked a wee bit of spark at times for me, a wee bit of energy.”

McCann is certainly providing that. Man on, Nedim!