GARY KEOWN: Celtic saw the future in Engels this week... while Rangers are stuck in the past with the same old tired faces

IN the quiet confidence and composure of fresh-faced Arne Engels, Celtic supporters can see real glimmers of a future worth believing in. For those across the city of Glasgow, the same old names having the same old arguments over the same old issues just makes Rangers feel like a club stuck firmly in the past.

And the brighter punters capable of taking off the blue-tinted specs and seeing life as it truly is must fear that this was the week where finally being left in the slipstream of their richer, stronger rivals — Espanyolification, as some like to call it — really started to move from much-discussed theory to evident truth.

Celtic smashing Slovan Bratislava 5-1 in their first game of the Champions League guarantees nothing in itself. The Slovaks were as poor as the Parkhead side were good. Far tougher tests lie in wait for Brendan Rodgers and his side and will offer greater opportunity to judge exactly where their summer renovation has taken them.

Likewise, wisdom would suggest it is best to temper enthusiasm about £11million signing Engels too. However, even after a handful of appearances, this boy just looks the part. He fits the profile of player Celtic should have been signing for years instead of diddling around in shallower pools for the likes of Gustaf Lagerbielke, Yuki Kobayashi and Oh Hyeon-gyu.

He's 21 and, already, appears to have the physique and technique to handle high-level competition. He is clearly being fast-tracked into the Belgium squad as it resets in the wake of a disappointing European Championship, having made his debut as a late substitute against Israel this month.

Even in the way he comports himself off-field, he creates the impression he is made of the right stuff to reach the top. Asked about the pressures involved in stepping up to take penalty-kicks after the Slovan match, he smiled: 'I'm always cool. I trust in myself.'

Before the game, puffing out his chest as he lined up to the sound of the Champions League theme, his body language roared: 'I'm here — and I belong here'.

In a country in which players two years old than him are still regarded as kids and generally have every bit of personality battered out of them by whoever does their club's media training — you know the drill, 'taking it one game at a time', 'just happy to be here' — it is refreshing to hear him say he feels Celtic can beat anyone in Europe's top competition. Even if they can't.

This is what comes from being brought up in a system and within clubs which have encouraged him to be himself. Celtic have won a watch signing him. Stay fit and healthy and he's going to be a star who turns a serious profit.

But here's the thing. He cannot become a one-off. This now has to be the standard at Parkhead. Sure, bargains can be picked up at lower prices and a bit of gambling in the market is fine. However, your chances of success — both on the park and in terms of gaining profit from sell-ons — heighten significantly with greater initial outlays.

They will also increase through building a proper recruitment set-up. Rodgers admitted during the window that Celtic needed to review their operations in that department — and they must.

They landed Engels with what is in place at the moment, but it is not enough. There needs to be a head of recruitment or sporting director. Maybe both. Rodgers will also have to accept he can't have complete control of the show either.

But Celtic have money coming out of their ears at the moment, with their main domestic rival in crisis, and they can't let this moment pass without putting in the right structures and the right people for the long-term. Something they have failed with in the recent past.

Committing £11m to a player remains a big deal in Scottish football. And signings of that level are not always guaranteed to work in terms of hauling in future funds.

Consider £9m Christopher Jullien. However, if Celtic can break that barrier of flogging talent for £30m-plus and build a reputation of selling to real, top-level clubs — something chairman Peter Lawwell regularly talked about during his time as chief exec — even the odd failure at that kind of price tag can be soaked up.

Unless Rangers find some sugar daddy with oodles of dough at hand, and that doesn't look like it's on the cards, Celtic are in an almost unassailable position if they do their business right, rather than giving people jobs in the showers or recruiting folk whose dads have been hanging around the place in prominent positions.

Yes, this is the last year of guaranteed Champions League money from an automatic league-phase place — sure to top £40m for the Parkhead side this term — but the Champions Path remains through qualifying and that should give them a strong chance of staying at the top table going forward.

Compare that to where Rangers find themselves. Where Celtic fans are swooning over Engels, Ibrox punters are burying their heads under the covers as former chairman Dave King starts chuntering on again from stage left.

Honestly, has anyone got the stomach for months and months of this? It is depressing. Just a sign of a club going nowhere. Other than backwards, that is. To tired old faces and guys who have been round the block before.

King had his shot in charge of the train set. He got some things right. He got loads of things wrong. Then, he left. Internal warfare and EGMs to get him back in the door are the last thing the place needs.

John Gilligan is back as interim chair in the wake of John Bennett stepping down. No offence to Gilligan. He has an impressive business background, but he's been a director before.

The guy entrusted to help him out, George Letham, has been a director before. Graeme Park is clearly having a say in things, too, and the shadow of his father Douglas still looms large.

All these guys did their bit when Rangers needed them nearly a decade ago, but it just feels like going round in circles. Only now, there is discord, and no clear view of where Rangers are going. Or aiming to go.

The squad is poor considering the money spent to assemble it. There are few assets, probably none, that could command a transfer fee close to eight figures. The summer window showed there are limited resources.

Vital positions within the club remain unfilled. It is an organisation that just reeks of stagnation.

Even manager Philippe Clement revealed just over a week ago, to little fanfare, that he 'had the choice to make in the summer' to carry on even though he knows 'the challenge is much bigger than it was last season'.

He opted to stay, of course. Had Domenico Tedesco been emptied as Belgium head coach, as was widely expected after the Euros, that decision might have been a little more testing.

Other than a new long-term contract, it is hard to know what led Clement to keep the faith. With his calls for unity likely to fall on deaf ears as the club's major shareholder chirrups from the sidelines, the past week must surely have him questioning it.