After leaving QPR in the summer, former Rangers manager Mark Warbuton was at a crossroads.

With job offers from the Championship he would have been expected to continue his managerial journey, but the Londoner has always retained a fondness for the road less travelled.

David Moyes was looking to replace the departed Stuart Pearce in his backroom team and wanted to know if Warburton fancied something totally different. The left-field pitch from the West Ham manager was to take a step back to move forward at one of the biggest clubs in Britain.

The Hammers, now happily settled in the state-of-the-art, 66,000-capacity London Stadium are clearly a club going places. With a squad packed with top-class international talent, a solid transfer budget (certainly by Scottish standards) and an experienced boss at the helm, they finished in seventh place last season.

Warburton has made a career out of reinvention having already famously ditched a high-earning job in the City for football so it's easy to see why this outside-the-box opportunity appealed to a 59-year-old who seems to relish throwing himself into situations outside his comfort zone.

"The whole point was to try something a bit different." he said. "I'm not 40 years of age and I thought 'how many more chances are there going to be to get a senior role at a Premier League club, work with Premier League players and have the opportunity to learn from a manager of the quality of David Moyes?'. 

"I'm proud of my CV and have a lot of games under my belt, managing some big clubs but you need to keep on learning and there is a manager, probably one of the best in the business with an outstanding CV with the clubs that he's managed and the games he's been involved in. So I wanted to challenge myself and make sure I can add value to a club of West Ham's stature so that was my thinking. 

"I'm only three weeks in but I'm enjoying it. There are some outstanding people at the club and outstanding players so I have to make sure I can add a bit of quality and value otherwise there's no point. I want to add a little something and that's my objective going forward and hopefully, I can achieve that." 

Warbuton returned to Ibrox for the first time on Tuesday night since his disputed, acrimonious 2017 departure. There's a lot of water under the bridge since then, and while Warburton might still harbour quiet discontent at what occurred, he has always remained totally respectful and complementary to his former club.

Rangers is a result he still looks for and his relationships with many at the club still hold to this day, not least masseur Davie Lavery and the club captain James Tavernier whom he picked up for a snip at £230,000 from Wigan in a deal that should have seen Warburton donning a highwayman mask.

"It was very enjoyable to return," he admitted. "It's a magnificent club. I saw some old familiar faces from the past and there's some really good people there. I've got some great relationships that have carried on from my leaving the club and we've stayed in close contact. It was really good to see them, no more than that. It's always a pleasure.

"I told the players to enjoy it. Many of them hadn't even been to Ibrox so I said to them it was one of the greatest football theatres in the world, which it really is. It looked magnificent."

The 3-1 win for Rangers was an even game but for a sensational 15 minute spell in the second half where Giovanni van Bronckhorst's ruthless side scored three goals thanks to some blistering forward play. Rabbi Matondo and Tom Lawrence were both exceptional having come on at the break in their home debuts. And Lawrence's contribution was no surprise to Warburton who tried to sign the 28-year-old winger for QPR in January.

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"He's a very talented player," he said. "He has individual goal-scoring ability, shooting from range, great technique. He sees a pass, is clever running with the ball and has clever movement. 

"When teams get into the low block and ask Rangers to break them down, Tom certainly has the attributes to do that. That's a very shrewd bit of business from Giovanni and likewise Tom, like any player, will relish the expectation of pulling on a blue jersey and in front of a crowd of that quality in a stadium of that stature. It's a good move, I think everyone will benefit from it and I'm looking forward to seeing how he progresses for Rangers."

While the new boys impressed for Rangers, Warburton was more concerned with how West Ham coped with their Ibrox examination. It was a disappointing display from David Moyes' side but Warburton stresses the importance of fitness at this stage of their pre-season.

He reflected: "We were disappointed with aspects of the performance but the key thing is getting minutes into players' legs. It's about preparation and I'm sure Giovanni is the same at Rangers - looking to get minutes into key players' legs and making sure it continues in a positive way, that's the key. It's all about gearing up towards that league opener.

"I think the game itself, Rangers started off better for the first 10 minutes. We had a spell where we had a big, big chance with a one-on-one with the keeper to take the lead but those are the little moments. Last night was about moving the ball and getting tempo to our play.

"I thought we had a good spell down the right-hand side then we go in 0-0 at half-time. But we had a really sloppy 15 minutes where Rangers moved the ball quickly and we gave them too much time and space. They punished us with some good football and good finishing.

"We got it back to 3-1 and missed a few opportunities to make it a tighter scoreline but overall, I'm sure both managers will be happy with the minutes although we were disappointed with aspects of our performance. That's why we play these games though."