Looking back on it now, appointing Mark Warburton as Rangers manager was a masterstroke by the Ibrox club.

Rangers won the Ladbrokes Championship with something to spare last season to finally clinch that elusive promotion to the Premiership.

On top of that, they lifted the Petrofac Training Cup, a competition that had caused them no end of heartache during their stint in the lower leagues, and reached the William Hill Scottish Cup final.

Most memorably for Rangers supporters, their Old Firm rivals Celtic were defeated on penalties in the semi-final final of that latter competition in a classic encounter at Hampden.

What is more, a lucrative place in the top flight was secured and their age-old city rivals vanquished by playing hugely entertaining football.

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Yet, it it is easy to forget that it was a huge gamble by the Rangers board bringing in such an inexperienced manager at such a critical period in their history 12 months ago this week.

Yes, Warburton was highly-regarded down in England as a result of his time in charge of tiny Brentford.

He had taken the Griffin Park club from League One into the Championship down south and then, despite having a far smaller budget and squad than their rivals, into the end-of-season play-offs.

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If Rangers hadn’t offered him a job then somebody somewhere most certainly would have.

However, the 52-year-old, a former City of London trader who had moved into coaching late in life, had only been a manager for 18 months.

Sure, he had a wealth of experience as a youth coach, academy head and a sporting director. But in the dugout? He was something of a novice. Indeed, he had only taken charge of less than 80 games.

Given the predicament that Rangers were in, appointing him was a major risk.

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The Ibrox club, which had just gone through a much-needed change of regime, was haemorrhaging money and relying on loans from wealthy benefactors to stay afloat.

It was, as chairman and major shareholder Dave King revealed at the AGM in the Clyde Auditorium in November, not a business model that could be sustained in the long-term.

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In short, going up last season was vital to a club dealing with a raft of historical issues and suffering as a result of years of corporate vandalism.

Failing to secure a place alongside the likes of Aberdeen, Celtic and Hearts in the Premiership would have had dire consequences.

Warburton promptly set about rebuilding a threadbare squad that had been depleted by a series of departures. Without the assistance of a scouting network, it was not an easy task.

He had far more money at his disposal than the other clubs in the second tier, in the whole of country apart from Celtic for that matter.

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But his predecessors’ experiences – both Ally McCoist and then Stuart McCall had failed in their attempts to complete the final stage of what had become known as “The Journey” - showed that was no guarantee of success.

The Englishman, though, recruited superbly. Wes Foderingham, Andy Halliday, Jason Holt, Rob Kiernan, James Tavernier, Martyn Waghorn and Danny Wilson have all done well and established themselves as first team regulars.

Warburton won his first 11 games in charge to enjoy the best start of any Rangers manager and beat the previous record of eight set by Bill Struth back in 1920.

A 3-1 defeat to St. Johnstone at Ibrox in the League Cup in September brought an end to his run and was the first time his charges had showed any signs of real fallibility.

His side was criticised for their tactical naivety and for being unable to cope with top flight opposition defensively – accusations which clearly rankled the man in charge.

A 2-1 defeat to nearest challengers Hibernian followed at Easter Road in November and further points were dropped to Livingston away and Morton at home.

A 2-1 loss to Falkirk away allowed Hibs, who had been nine points adrift at one stage in the 2015/16 campaign, to draw level and the pressure was well and truly on Warburton and Rangers.

The 4-2 win over Alan Stubbs’s side at Ibrox at the end of December was a significant turning point for Rangers. Jason Holt bagged a first half double and Nick Clark and Waghorn both netted in the second half.

A change to a noticeably less gung-ho style of play also helped. Warburton started to keep three players back when one full back was attacking and his side began to grind out results, not blow opposition teams away, as a consequence.

He also tempered his desire to play entertainers like Barrie McKay, Nathan Oduwa and Gedion Zelalem in the same starting line-up and his side became more dependable as a result.

The loss of leading scorer Waghorn could have been costly given Warburton’s insistence on having a lean squad. But Kenny Miller, at the grand old age of 36, made up for his absence and then some.

The league was finally clinched with a routine 1-0 defeat to Dumbarton at Ibrox at the start of April witnessed by an astonishing crowd of 48,568.

The 3-2 Scottish Cup final defeat to Hibs was a disappointing way for Warburton to end what had been a hugely successful season.

However, with the arrival of Joey Barton, next term promises to be every bit as memorable, possibly even more so, for Mark Warburton and for Rangers.