Rangers boss Philippe Clement does not seemingly plan to bring former playmaker Thomas Buffel back to Ibrox.
Rangers have a new manager in place with Philippe Clement announced as Michael Beale’s replacement on Sunday.
Two weeks on from Beale’s sacking, Rangers have a new man in the dugout with Clement getting down to work.
Clement is back in management having lost his job at Monaco over the summer and will be desperate to rebuild his standing in the game.
The 49-year-old was a huge success in Belgium with Genk and Club Brugge but endured a mixed time with Monaco.
Thomas Buffel unlikely to join Philippe Clement at Rangers
Clement will back himself to excel at Rangers and will now move to build a coaching staff around him at Ibrox.
Belgian coach Stephan van der Heyden is following Clement to Rangers but Thomas Buffel seemingly won’t be doing the same.
Buffel is not only Belgian and not only played for Rangers, but also played under Clement at Club Brugge.
Clement and Buffel even played together for Belgium in the early-to-mid 2000’s, so a reunion at Rangers seemed to make sense.
However, Rangers Review suggest that Buffel will not be joining forces with Clement in Glasgow.
Buffel currently serves as assistant manager with the Belgium Under-21’s and has no plans to move on right now.
Maybe this is one that Rangers will look at down the line but, for now, Buffel will not be heading back to Ibrox.
Two more coach links played down
Rangers Review add that Jonas Ivens and Johan van Rumst are not expected to be at Rangers either.
Both Ivens and Van Rumst worked with Clement at Club Brugge and Monaco, which some thought would pave the way for an Ibrox reunion.
However, they will not form Clement’s coaching staff as he starts work at Auchenhowie today.
Clement may keep his team fairly small; Van de Heyden is already on board and Rangers want to land a Scottish coach to work with the new boss.
That may be it for Clement but we would expect to see some other Belgian names mentioned until a final coaching team is announced.
