Pasty, pallid, peely-wally, ashen?

Call it what you like, there's not been much colour about the cheeks of those involved with Rangers of late. Kenny McDowall, for instance, had been sporting the kind of grey, sombre features you'd tend to find on the gargoyles of Notre Dame over these past few weeks but having been finally relieved of the managerial duties that were foisted upon him, he's probably now a gleaming picture of health.

While McDowall, the reluctant recipient of the Rangers reins, bore more than a passing resemblance to a haunted cave, Stuart McCall breezed into Murray Park yesterday with the kind of sparkling effervescence you'd find at a Moet & Chandon office party. Will the new caretaker manager be toasting promotion with bubbly at the end of a turbulent season? Who knows, but the 50-year-old is certainly ready for the challenge. It won't be easy and the Scottish Championship play-offs - should they remain in the top-four - will be a fraught old affair but if McCall ends up drinking the celebratory champagne, nobody at Ibrox will care how he got the cork out of the bottle. McCall resigned from his previous post with Motherwell because the stresses and strains were giving him sleepless nights. Taking on the job at Rangers could be viewed as the stuff of nightmares but McCall is the dreamer who dares to dream. "Promotion is something to dream about and there will be sleepless nights but I want the lads to have a focus about promotion and picture themselves running around Ibrox having done it," he said.

His position may just be until the end of the current campaign but for McCall this is, in many ways, the dream job and one that he thought would never present itself to him. A Rangers great as a player, McCall now has the chance to make his mark as a manager. While many have had the enthusiasm sucked right out of them amid all the trials and tribulations of the club's plight, the establishment of a new regime at board level has lifted morale and injected renewed vigour. McCall admitted that he wouldn't have been here had there not been major changes at the running of the club but there was and here he is. It was miserable and lashing with rain as he took his first training session but the new man at the helm was in his element. "I was just so glad to be back out on the training ground, it was such a buzz and I loved it," added McCall, who has been working as a coach with the Scotland set up and stressed that he made no decisions on his future until he had spoken to the national team manager, Gordon Strachan. "It hasn't sunk in and it won't sink in for a while. I got a call yesterday morning asking me in for a meeting. Within half an hour I was offered the job. Once it was all clear, the group text went out to the players telling them to report for training in the morning. The quicker we can get working with the players the better and naturally there's a spring in your step when it's a new voice on the training pitch.

"I have knocked back three or four other opportunities but was I waiting for this? No, not for a second. The other opportunities just weren't right for me. There has been speculation about different managers but I took the call right out of the blue to come and meet Rangers and the offer was there. There was no time to think about it but I didn't make any decision until I spoke to Gordon. I rang him four times but he was on the golf course in Spain and when he finally answered he said 'I take it it's about the Rangers job'? He was fantastic. His advice was terrific and he has really helped since I have been working with Scotland. As much as people have said to me 'good luck you're going to need it' I could never have dreamt of myself doing it. For me to be given the opportunity is beyond belief. I got a nice text from my daughter pointing out that I had played and managed Bradford. I have played for Scotland and worked on the management team and now I'm managing Rangers having played for them. I want to make it a success. I'm not an over-confident person. I know it will be a struggle and I will beat myself up every day but I will do my best."

For McCall, the only way is up and going up is the main objective but football can be a fickle old game. "My question to the board was: 'What do you see as success?'" said McCall, who takes over a toiling team that has won just one of its last seven fixtures. "I don't want to do as well as I can, turn it around, and then see other manager coming in. Progress will obviously be an upturn in results and everyone will say success is gaining promotion to the Premiership. But you could get to the second leg of the play off final, see your goalkeeper sent off and lose on penalty kicks. It can be a thin line between whether you go up or not. We've got to improve our performance and it's about self belief and regaining confidence. There is no guarantee we are going to be in there but that is the aim. I want to be playing that 11th team at the end of the season ... I just hope it's not Motherwell."