From the outside looking in, pressure has been growing on Rangers boss Philippe Clement.
Before today’s win over St Johnstone, Gers had just one win from their last five and had drawn the previous two games against Hibs and Dundee.
It leaves them 15 points behind Celtic in the title race, with the other side of the city set to wrap up another title win.
Rangers fan group the Union Bears sent a message to the club and to the manager by staging a walkout on 55 minutes, having displayed banners in protest during their time in the stadium.
It came after a statement from the ultras as they demanded Rangers sack Clement but also insisted the club’s problems run far deeper.
Clement gave his response to Gers fans pre-match and insisted he understands their frustrations at results, which he shares.
The club had already backed their man with CEO Patrick Stewart insisting they are behind him.
The Belgian faced more questions post-match after the comfortable victory over the Premiership’s bottom team.
- READ MORE: Billy Dodds uses one word to describe Rangers v St Johnstone and discusses Ibrox ‘walkout’
Clement quizzed on Rangers pressure
And he attempted to play down any suggestion that he was under pressure and insists he always knew he had the backing of those in power at the club.
Reiterating that he is not happy with the away form, he insists his only focus is on improving that.
Clement asked: “What pressure?
“No, the only pressure I have is that I’m not happy with the away results. That’s my pressure.
“I told you guys, and maybe you still don’t know me, but I want to win every game. That’s my pressure. So if that’s not the case, I’m not happy with things and I’m very ambitious to make things better. That’s the only pressure I have.
“I know that [the club are behind me]. I know that, and I spoke with Patrick already a lot. He’s not long in the building, but I’m very happy that he’s here.
“I’ve been six, seven months sometimes feeling alone in the desert and addressing things to make better in the club, or that I saw things regressing because the situation – I feel – is very motivated to make things better.
“That will help me, that will help the football department, but it will help everything inside the club. So I’m happy that we can have really open and sometimes critical discussions about it.”
Clement’s take on Rangers vs St Johnstone
”We played a very good first half with good tempo, good goals, good positive aggressivity, good pressing, a lot of positives,” Clement told Sky Sports.
”Second half we went down in our tempo and made also changes and you saw that we lost fluidity in our game.
”In that way we still had good moments but less, much less than in the first half.
”I don’t want (a drop-off) to be inevitable. I want four, five, six, as much as possible.
”But it’s also a face with players coming back out of a long term injury that need to get rhythm and they’re not at their best yet in that way when they come on.
”No, we wanted more. We could’ve score more also in this second half but it didn’t happen and OK, we need to continue to look towards Wednesday.“
