For Stuart McCall, the hope is that the sleepless nights that preceded his exit from Motherwell can be replaced by a sweet dream. Visualising the joy of completing the journey back to the top flight is something he wants all now under his command at Rangers to do. The power of positive thinking will be deployed in the fight for promotion McCall took on Thursday evening. The 50-year-old stepped down from his post at Fir Park in November after admitting much soul-searching in a bid to halt a form slump. New Rangers manager Stuart McCall raises the club scarf after being unveiled on Thursday afternoon . The new Rangers boss takes his first training session at Murray Park on Thursday afternoon . His was surely a classic case of becoming a victim of your own success. Hindsight only makes the prior back-to-back second places finishes he attained on a meagre budget look all the more incredible. Revitalised, refreshed and fully motivated, the lure of resuming his managerial career with a return to Ibrox was simply too great to resist. McCall’s current deal only runs to the end of the season but if his infectious enthusiasm can transform an underachieving, down-in-the mouth squad into play-off victors then his claim for a longer stay will be extremely difficult to ignore. He won six titles and five cups in seven years as a midfielder with Walter Smith’s all-conquering side of the 1990s, but reckons taking Rangers up this season might well be the greatest achievement of his footballing life. ‘It would have to be up there and I have been quite fortunate in my time,’ he mused. ‘Yeah, I suppose it would be. ‘There might still be sleepless nights but it is something to dream about. I want the lads to have a focus about that. Picture yourself running around Ibrox having won promotion. The former Motherwell manager has taken charge of the Ibrox club for the rest of the season . The former Bradford player faces the press as he is unveiled on Thursday . ‘The lads who have been here have done it for two years. Obviously the circumstances were quite different. ‘I would think at this moment in time - and I am not putting the boot into the players because they know this themselves - anyone who has watched Rangers for the last three or four months would say they would struggle. ‘But there are enough good players in the squad I saw as I looked around in our meeting today. ‘They wouldn’t be at Rangers if they weren’t good players. I saw flashes of it today in training. Go and express yourself. All of the players who have come from all these different clubs, I would have signed most of them. ‘It hasn’t sunk in and it won’t sink in for a while. But I’m going to make the most of it.’ McCall believes his new charges still have what it takes and, clearly, he wouldn’t have been getting to grips with a new office in Murray Park if he didn’ t think he could work a little magic alongside trusted assistant Kenny Black. ‘When I got the opportunity, I thought about the whole thing last night,’ said McCall, reflecting on the whirlwind of events that led to him replacing caretaker manager Kenny McDowall, who has made an amicable exit. ‘In an ideal world you will come in for pre-season and have four-six weeks to look at players, try different systems, and look at strengths and weaknesses. That’s obviously not going to happen and I will have to hit the ground running. ‘But just being out on the training ground again gave me a buzz and I’m relishing it. The results have got to be right, of course. ‘There have only been 13 managers in about 123 years so 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.’ Rangers announced that caretaker manager Kenny McDowall has left the club ahead of a new appointmnet . McCall (centre right) celebrates the 1992 SPL during his Rangers playing days with the Ibrox club . He inherits a squad where a dozen first-team players are coming to the end of their contracts but insists that should only add to the shared motivation to stick around a while longer. ‘This club might not know until May 30 what league they are going to be playing in next season. ‘So regardless of who is manager, I don’t think contracts are going to be handed out at this moment in time. ‘I’m sure Hearts will be handing out contracts to a lot of players, because they know they are going to be in the Premiership next season and they deserve to. ‘So the message to the lads out of contract here is “go and and earn yourself one”. They can still turn it around. ‘If they play well and we do well as a team, is there a possibility I might be here next season? Yes, it’s a possibility. But it’s down to themselves if they are here. It’s still in their hands.’ McCall will open his tenure with tomorrow’s home game against Livingston as he seeks to eat into the five-point lead Hibernian currently have in second place. What, though, if Rangers can battle through to the play-off final and have to meet his old love Motherwell to complete the job? ‘It would make me sick,’ he grimaced. ‘It would. But I honestly hope – and believe – they won’t be in the bottom two. ‘I’ve had a lot of texts from the Motherwell lads. I think the signings of McDonald and Pearson coming back will really help them and I think there is enough there. ‘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 and I’m confident they are good enough to get out of it.’ McCall will take a sabbatical from his role in Gordon Strachan’s backroom staff for the matches against Northern Ireland and Gibraltar later this month as he focuses on his short-term challenge. The future beyond that remains unclear – with a longer appointment at Ibrox almost certainly meaning his exit from the national set-up - but he insisted the former Celtic manager had been a source of sage advice. ‘I didn’t make any decision until I spoke to Gordon Strachan,’ he added. ‘I spoke to him about 6.30pm the other night. He had just come off the golf course in Spain and he said: “I take it it’s about the Rangers job?” ‘He was fantastic. I won’t go into what he said, but his advice was terrific. He has really helped since I have been working with Scotland. I didn’t know him until he offered me the post out of the blue. ‘I won’t be involved in the Northern Ireland and Gibraltar games but who knows what might happen in the future.’
Stuart McCall was named as the Rangers manager until end of the season . Former Motherwell boss said it was a gamble he could not turn down . McCall says that promotion to the Scottish Premiership is the club's goal . Caretaker manager Kenny McDowall left the club on Thursday .