PEDRO Caixinha has raised more than the odd eyebrow with his musings since his arrival in Scotland, but one of his most startling was the claim that Carlos Pena was among the three fittest players at the club.

There seems to be a general consensus that the Mexican international has been a long way off the pace in his short career in Scotland, but the Rangers manager can’t understand the focus on Pena while the contribution of two of his marquee signings, Scots Ryan Jack and Graham Dorrans, escapes the same level of scrutiny. For Caixinha, the entire Rangers midfield is a work in progress, and he feels that all of his players in that key area have to up their game.

“Football is not all about fitness, football is about decisions,” he said. “And the decisions that we are preparing Carlos to make are when he is restricted in time and space, and how to make quick decisions. When he has time and space, he performs his football, so he just needs to adapt to when he doesn’t have time and space, and that’s nothing to do with fitness.

“I think it’s a question of adaptation – for you to understand what’s going on. For example, we are talking about Carlos, who has come in and adapted.

“Now, I think we have two of the best midfielders in Scotland. I’m talking about Jack and Dorrans, but the majority of the time they receive the ball, they receive it in a safe position, facing our own goal. And the passes they perform also need to be sometimes forward and they are in the back. They are Scottish. Nobody discusses fitness levels. It’s the same, it’s about decisions.

“I can also tell you that looking forward in the game and being the first pass forward, and being proactive by looking at the spaces in front, is another type of work we are doing with our midfielders and they are Scottish.

“I think [Carlos] has much more to give, believe me. I think he’s at 60 per cent of his capabilities. But I think the first step for everyone to progress is knowing you need to progress.

“It’s when you’re looking to add something and you say ‘OK, I agree. Let’s work on it.’ We are working. It’s a question of time.”

The emphatic 4-1 win over Hamilton on Friday night hinted at progress. And despite the internal dressing-room turmoil of the past week and the banishment of Kenny Miller to the Under-20s, it would be hard to argue that those wearing light blue in Lanarkshire weren’t fighting for their manager.

Caixinha contends that, with time, his Rangers side will get to where he wants them to be, with the players putting everything into their individual training programmes to get the collective unit moving in the right direction.

“We identify the details, we present the details to the players and we work on those specifics on the training pitch,” he said. “We try to do specific drills in that direction. We do that with all the players. I can give you another example. [Alfredo] Morelos sometimes needs to retain the ball more often – when to retain the ball and when to pass it. We are also working on those situations.

“He is very powerful when he shoots but when he is facing the goalkeeper and he needs to take the decision to look for a corner – that is something he needs to improve.

“Everyone is trying to move in that direction individually because if you are better individually, we will be better collectively. All the players need to have that sort of specific work, not only one.

“We need to keep moving. I can tell you that the club is different at this moment. I can feel that from top to bottom everyone is involved in the way we need them to get involved, and everybody is working hard to take the club in the right direction. We still have a long way to go, but we are making steps in that direction.”

It is not only on the field that Caixinha is attempting to bring progress to Rangers. In tandem with director of football Mark Allen, the Portuguese is attempting to drag the club’s infrastructure into the 21st century.

“We share more or less the same vision,” said Caixinha. “We work together, we work as a team. He’s about to bring his own team now to work with us, so I think we will have the conditions from a football point of view to have the one relationship from top to bottom, right through the youth system as well.

“The club’s philosophy, player profiles, all these things we have to establish now to keep it moving.

“With facilities now, we are also changing a lot of things. We are starting with the offices here, some more tools for the training sessions, new video tools to analyse everything, a new cryo-spa for recovery and some new bikes for recovery as well. We are trying to change these things. It’s a question of time.

“When you buy a product, you know it is going to have a lifetime, and the facilities have been here 16 years. That means you have to try to start to reorganise with new tools because football is different to how it was 16 years ago.”

It may well be, but some things remain the same, such as rows between club and country over player availability. Caixinha makes no secret of the fact he would rather defender Ross McCrorie came with his team to Toronto this week for Friday evening’s Eusebio Cup match against Benfica, but he says there is no issue between himself and Scotland Under-21 boss Scot Gemmill, who has instead called upon McCrorie for the games against England and Latvia.

“The 21s are playing an official match and I want him to be involved in the squad,” Caixinha said. “It gives us a problem because at the moment all we have is Fabio [Cardoso], so maybe we need to go with Fabio and Aidan Wilson.

“We will need a third centre-half if Bruno is with the Portugal national team. It’s a Fifa date, so there’s no problem. The Under-19s have a friendly match [against France] so maybe I have to ask for Aidan and Jamie Barjonas.”