SO now we know. Pedro Caixinha is not a magician. Neither does he wear a magic hat. But there is a kind of sorcery and alchemy in the air on days like this, as this largely unknown 46-year-old from Portugal walked up the marbled staircase at Ibrox to be announced as the 16th holder of the office of Rangers manager.

All those illustrious predecessors stared down on him from the walls of the blue room, this 46-year-old from Portugal enchanted a room full of grizzled journalists with heady talk of returning Rangers to the days of European glory. Presumably this means the kind that he briefly witnessed as an assistant at Panathinaikos when the Ibrox side were en route to the 2008 Uefa Cup final but even those days seem a fair way off right now. Smoke and mirrors some would perhaps call it but if the world knows anything about the former manager of Santos Laguna and Al-Gharafa it is that he interviews well. So it was in the course of this bravura performance where he said most of the right things.

Saying you have joined the biggest club in Scotland? Check. Saying you hope to win back the league title from Celtic and deliver a European trophy? Check. Claiming you have also inherited the best squad in Scotland? When you are 33 points behind your historic rivals in the Ladbrokes Premiership and are likely to oversee fairly sizeable personnel changes in the next few months? That was the only time this matador who once threw himself on his grounded father to spare him from being gored could be accused of talking a load of bull.

No crowds were thronging Edmiston Drive to mob the new arrival at 3pm on a Monday afternoon, but then like a similarly inconclusive row over Donald Trump and Barack Obama's inauguration figures, Mark Warburton's arrival hardly caused Govan gridlock either. But much like his own interview process, it didn't take long to figure out why the Ibrox club's three-man selection panel took such a shine to this man from Portugal.

Caixinha took the bull by the horns here, jumping from subject to subject with aplomb. The kind of man who will tackle things head on, it would have been fun to see how he might have dealt with the Joey Barton scenario. "I don't fight bulls," he said. "Bulls try to fight me. When I need to speak something, I speak something in front of you. If that means I am a tough guy then I am a tough guy. But I am a demanding guy. The first person I need to be demanding with is myself. But if I am demanding with myself, I cannot let the other guys be less demanding than me."

Caixinha said he was "a frontal guy" and this was a full-frontal assault on the senses. Why had he made such a financial sacrifice to ditch cash rich Qatar for the sleepy backwater that is Scottish football? "When I started coaching the under-14 team in my city they paid the other coaches €500 a month and I was earning €150," said this man, who has a combined total of 19 years coaching experience. "I don’t care about the money."

Fair enough. And then there was the obligatory mention of Mourinho, a friend and fellow graduate of the SFA's coaching courses in Largs, although Caixinha was coy about the comparison. No wonder, you might say, considering the 12 teams in 18 years he has been through and his lack of top flight leagues and European trophies compared to his revered countryman. But if not the special one, then Caixinha was at least "not coming here just to be another one".

Caixinha has been around. He once scouted a match at the spartan surroundings of the Tulloch Caledonian Stadium, but he hopes to address his lack of local knowledge with a Scottish assistant who can form a bridge with the current group of players. He will supply the board with a shortlist and let them to do the rest.

A "workaholic", with an "addiction" to football, Caixinha claims to be ready for the Glasgow goldfish bowl after ditching the mayhem of Mexico for the detachment of Qatar. We learned that he might go out for a meal once a week, and go to the pictures or a show, but the rest of his time will be devoted to making Rangers better. His footballing philosophy was a "massive attack".

Caixinha has signed a three year deal at Rangers, and yesterday he went into a bit more details about his pledge. He will come into Murray Park at 7am each day and leave when his tasks for the day are done. With 16 managers in 144 years he could even be here for a decade. Some magical inspiration may be required if he is to manage to fulfil most of his manifesto, but at least some Portuguese perspiration will be a start.