Warburton warned losing the Scottish identity of his Rangers side will dent their Premiership hopes

Gers manager Warburton has wasted no time in preparing for a tilt at the Scottish title since clinching promotion to the top flight with victory in the Championship back in April.

He has brought in teenage midfielder Jordan Rossiter from Liverpool and pulled off a major transfer coup by securing the services of the vastly experienced Joey Barton.

Read more: Walsall boss resigned to losing star striker Tom Bradshaw to Rangers

On top of those two high-profile acquisitions, Accrington Stanley duo Matt Crooks and Josh Windass were signed on pre-contract agreements back in January.

Warburton, who worked in a variety of roles in his native England with Watford and Brentford before moving to Scotland last summer, has also been linked with several other players down south.

They include veteran Queens Park defender Clint Hill, former Croatian internationalist Niko Kranjcar and Walsall striker Tom Bradshaw.

Elsewhere, Nicky Clark, Nicky Law, Dean Shiels and David Templeton, whose contracts at Ibrox all expired at the end of last month, have been released.

And Cammy Bell, the goalkeeper who didn’t feature for Rangers at all last season despite recovering from injury, has been tipped to join relegated Dundee United in the coming weeks.

On top of that, Ian Durrant, the Light Blues great who was coaching the under-20 side at Auchenhowie, has been told his services are no longer required by the club he first joined 32 years ago.

Scott Nisbet, who played for Rangers during the Nine-In-A-Row era in the 1990s, believes it is crucial that Warburton retains a Scottish spine to his side to ensure success in the 2016/17 campaign.

“It’s important to keep the Scottish feel to the Rangers team,” he said. “The team I played in had a lot of great English players - Trevor Steven, Mark Hateley, Ray Wilkins and Nigel Spackman were all at Ibrox in my time.

“But when we played in the Champions League the majority of the side was Scottish because UEFA had the three foreigner rule at that time.

"But we still had a great team. We went undefeated in the Champions League in the 1992/93 season. It is very important for Rangers to keep that Scottish connection.

“Back then, they had myself, Ian Durrant, Ian Ferguson, Ally McCoist, Richard Gough, John Brown, Andy Goram.

"They were guys who all knew what Rangers were about, who grew up supporting the team, who were fulfilling lifelong dreams when they put that jersey on and ran out the tunnel at Ibrox in front of 50,000 people.

“It is very important for the club to have Rangers people involved and at the moment they do. They have John Greig as their honorary president, Richard Gough, too, is an ambassador for Rangers and he goes all around the world in that role.

“Kenny Miller knows what Rangers is about, Lee Wallace knows what Rangers is about, Andy Halliday knows what Rangers is about and Davie Weir knows what Rangers is about. It is massive to keep that connection at Rangers. You can bring in players, but you need to keep that Scottish identity.

“They will be going up into the Premiership next season and will be playing the likes of Aberdeen at Pittodrie, Celtic at Parkhead and Hearts at Tynecastle. Having guys who have been there before and can show the new boys what playing for Rangers is all about will be important to them.”