Showdown Rangers recruitment talks revealed as Clement demands one thing over what's really wrong at Ibrox

Philippe Clement has revealed he held "honest" discussions with the Rangers board this week after falling short in their bid to oust arch rivals Celtic from securing the Premiership title.

The Ibrox boss reckons the club have reached the end of a cycle after seeing their title dream diminish over the last couple of weeks, with the Hoops wrapping up the trophy in style with a 5-0 demolition of Kilmarnock at Rugby Park on Wednesday night.

And Clement has since outlined to the Gers hierarchy what is required in terms of recruitment this summer and identifying key issues which has consigned them to a runners-up spot behind Brendan Rodgers’ men for a third consecutive season.

The Light Blues wrap up their league campaign against Hearts at Tynecastle on Saturday in what is officially a dead-rubber. Speaking ahead of the trip to Edinburgh, Clement admitted: “I had really good talks with the board, about what to change towards recruitment and we are aligned. We have plans and we now need to execute them, we are busy looking at all the departments and what we can make better to improve next season.

“I am really convinced that the people in the club want to make steps forward, work hard and be honest about what is going wrong in the club. Everyone is really engaged to make things better. I know there are emotions now which is normal. We are all very ambitious.

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“There will be changes, we need changes. I think we are at the end of a cycle as a club, we need to change something and I want to end this cycle with a really big moment next Saturday at Hampden.”

The Belgian wants to add greater physicality to his side net season, a theme he believes should be at the core of the club moving forward to help them handle a congested fixture programme in terms of both European and domestic competition.

He added: “We are going into a pre-season that needs to be hard, we need to build physical to be able to play at a high intensity three times a week and avoid so many injuries. We need to start pre-season strong ahead of qualifiers and the league. Disappointed as I want to win everything and become champion. We could not close the gap enough, we need to leave that behind us and look at how to make us better moving forward which we are very busy with.”