So, the optimism that had built up around Philippe Clement’s Rangers following an impressive run of form pre-Christmas didn’t last long, then.
While a genuine fight for the Scottish Premiership title always looked beyond The Gers – Old Firm rivals Celtic are a runaway train at the top of the table right now – four successive league wins at least lifted the Glasgow giants up into second and threatened to restore some pride to another disappointing domestic campaign.
At least, that was until a dismal Rangers travelled to Paisley on Boxing Day that is.
Suffering a first Premiership defeat since losing to Aberdeen in October, Caolan Boyd-Munce fired home a 93rd minute winner to leave Philippe Clement irate.
The Rangers boss was particularly disappointed with the manner of the defeat, let alone the scoreline. Clement feels his side simply lacked the aggression required against a team willing to fight tooth and nail for every loose ball.
And while Boyd-Munce’s strike may have come three minutes into stoppage time, Clement feels that the foundations for a damaging loss were laid in the first 45.
Philippe Clement ‘so angry’ as Rangers lost at St Mirren
“They didn’t give it in the first half, that’s clear. We lost the game there, that’s why I was so angry at half-time,” Clement tells reporters at full-time. “We played far below our level in every sense. On the ball, without the ball, in the duels, in movements, in everything.”
Connor Barron and Nedim Bajrami were both sacrificed at the break, Clement calling upon striker Danilo and Nico Raskin.
Raskin has been in outstanding form in Rangers colours of late – the Belgian currently the club’s best ball-winner – while Danilo would equaliser on the hour mark to continue his own resurgence.
Clement, meanwhile, insists that while Barron and Bajrami were the two taken off, the same fate could have befallen pretty much anyone in his starting XI.
Clement explains why Rangers lost in Premiership reverse
“I made two changes and it’s not about the two guys, it was the whole team,” Clement sighs. “I could have made eight or nine changes maybe.
“And [then] you lose the game because, in the second-half, you see what you want to see. You see the football you want to see, you see the intensity you want to see, you see the duels you want to see, you see the chances you want to see.
“The only thing that we missed there is to score two, three, four goals, which we could have done. And also credit to St Mirren for how they throw their bodies in front of us on the goal line or in the box, preventing these things.
“But we lost the game ourselves in the first half with not showing the level that we need to show.
“It’s not a tactical thing because there was no big change in tactics in the second-half. It’s about quality, that moment, intensity. And that’s the frustrating part, that I didn’t see that one coming or nobody saw that one coming, if you see the consistency over the last two months.
“So, yeah, that’s something to analyse deeply as a squad, how it can happen.”
Rangers are now 12 points adrift of Celtic, Brendan Rodgers’ team blitzing Motherwell 4-0 at Parkhead earlier in the day.
