What next for Steven Davis? Rangers caretaker admits injury rehab on back burner as he mulls over return to playing or coaching

Steven Davis will take charge of Rangers when they head to Paisley to face St Mirren.

Steven Davis was not expecting the call from the Rangers board. Focusing on returning as a player following a serious knee injury, being an interim coach was not on the radar.

This has therefore been one of the most challenging weeks of Davis’ career. Tasked with holding the fort while the Rangers hierarchy search for Michael Beale’s successor as manager, the 38-year-old’s first taste of being the boss came in Cyprus as his beleaguered team were defeated 2-1 by Aris Limassol in the Europa League. Davis will once again be in charge for Sunday’s Premiership match away at in-form St Mirren before the league shuts down for two weeks. A new boss is expected to be in place when Hibs visit Ibrox on October 21.

What happens to Davis next is less clear. The Northern Ireland internationalist had been keen to make a playing return but admits that his recovery from injury has not been going as well as expected. Unsurprisingly, there has been precious little time to rehabilitate his knee while picking up the wreckage of the Beale era.

“I probably had about 24 hours to prepare,” revealed Davis on his elevation to the dugout. “Everything has happened so fast. I just thought: ‘Right, what would I want in that moment’? I’ve tried to use my experience and what I’ve picked up. But ultimately, you have to be yourself. If you’re not, people will see through you. I’ve got enough relationships within the dressing-room and I want to try and help them. I’ve got huge frustration about Thursday night and how it worked out. But we’ve got a quick turnaround and we have to put it right against St Mirren.”

Davis, who has played more than 350 times for Rangers and has 140 caps for Northern Ireland, makes no secret of where his priorities initially lay. “Initially after my injury, that was my number one intention [to play again],” he said. But my rehab hasn’t been as smooth as I would have liked. I’m a bit behind schedule from where I might have been. I’m at the stage now where I’m assessing things every couple of weeks and seeing how it develops, in terms of getting back to playing. The longer it goes, the less time you have at my age. No decision has been made but this opportunity came up and that has delayed my rehab for now. There has definitely been no rehab in the last few days, that’s for sure.”

With an appointment anticipated in the coming days, Davis will discover soon enough if he remains part of the furniture. “I haven’t given that any consideration because this has come so much out of the blue,” the midfielder admitted. “In terms of the number of games I might take, it’s up in the air. I knew the remit, it was just a case of trying to influence things in the short term. I’ll assess it as I go along and that will be determined by who comes in. I wouldn’t want to speculate on anything too far ahead.”

In the shorter term, overcoming St Mirren – unbeaten in the league this season – takes huge priority to give the new man a better chance of making a fist of a so-far meek title challenge.