After Celtic mercilessly dispatched Hearts 4-1 later in the day, Rangers find themselves 11 points behind in the Scottish Premiership.

The Gers also missed their chance to reduce the gap between themselves and Aberdeen to six points following the Dons’ 2-1 defeat to St Mirren.

Philippe Clément highlights an improvement in his performance in the second half as he frustratedly dodged questions about his future as Rangers director.

But Jack Butland believes there are no ‘positives’ to be found in the 45 seconds after his teammates gave Rangers a mountain to climb in the first half.

Jack Butland dismisses Rangers’ second half

“We won’t have to wait until the second half to get going,” Butland told RangersTV.

“The game is the way it is in the second half because they are holding on to something.

“We can’t also use that as a positive sign that we were in the ascendant or anything like that.

“We have to be better. We’re giving up too many easy goals against teams just looking to hang on.

“We didn’t win. It’s not ideal and it’s not a good result at all and we should never draw. It feels like a loss.

“These games have to be wins, they have to be wins.”

It was afterwards that Clément said: “In the second half, I saw what I wanted to see from my team. How I want to see how we play football, how I want to see how we press, how we create chances, how we don’t concede them.

“It was all there, only the second goal not to score and that’s what’s frustrating after this evening. In the first half I wasn’t satisfied. I didn’t see enough courage, enough movement and enough initiative from the team.

“So we need to show more of what we did in the second half and that’s what we need to show more in the future.”

Rangers goalkeeper says fans ‘deserve’ better

While Rangers captain of the day Jack Butland was the man in front of the cameras, the goalkeeper gave a glimpse of a dressing room with growing dismay.

THE Ibrox Stopper himself hasn’t quite reached the heights of the last campaign and has criticized the Rangers team to systematically put themselves in “difficult positions”.

The Rangers goalkeeper says the club needs to do “a lot more” and admits paying fans “deserve” a lot better.

“It’s not that we haven’t taken control,” Butland said. “It’s just about doing enough to bring the game to them, to take the game away from them.

“They come here to try to get a result. Trying to be difficult, trying to be awkward, that’s what teams are going to bring when they come here.

“But he needs more from us. We need more and these things, these goals, are not happening because we are in the ascendant in the first half, playing with more intensity.

“We didn’t do it in the first half and we haven’t done it in enough first halves this season and we made life difficult.

“It’s not for lack of trying, it’s not for the encores, you just have to do it.

“There’s no point in talking about it. You can talk about it until you’re blue in the face. It just needs to be done. This is the norm.

“At the end of the day you put yourself in difficult positions and right now we are.

“I hate having these conversations. This is not what the supporters who traveled deserve, this is not what the ground staff and everyone who had the match, the pitch, the surrounding areas and the conditions necessary to play deserve.

“It’s not what the paying fans deserve from today’s game, so yeah, I didn’t enjoy it, I didn’t enjoy the result and we need to do more, a lot more.”

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