Frazzled Philippe Clement admitted Rangers have no excuse for failing to drag themselves back into the title race.
The Ibrox side were handed a major opportunity to put themselves back into the mix at the top end of the Premiership after early pacesetters Celtic and Aberdeen battled out a 2-2 stalemate on Saturday. But instead of cutting the gap down to three points, they now find themselves six behind Brendan Rodgers and Jimmy Thelin’sunbeaten leaders.
Amid blustery conditions, it was Marley Watkins who tamed a late bouncing ball to hand Kilmarnock a shock win at Rugby Park. Derek McInnes’ committed Killie outfit more than deserved their result as they match ragged Rangers all over the park. And Clement could find nothing to mitigate a disastrous afternoon in Ayrshire. He said: “I don’t want excuses about pitches, wind, whatever. We need to focus on ourselves, on the team, on the players, on the new players coming in, to get them at their best level, on the players who were here, to get to their best level also, and to play better than we did today.
“We got game that you expect, and all respect to Kilmarnock in that way. That’s also why they’ve only been beaten by Celtic and us in almost the last year. But there’s no excuse in that way. We knew the conditions we’d face here.
“I was not happy with the first half in that way, that we didn’t create enough chances and we gave away too many situations in the duels, that we were not good enough. On the long balls, in the first ball, second ball, it was much better in the second half.
“But that’s then the disappointing thing, the moment that you take much more control of the game. In general, if you had a ball in the game, I think it was around 70 per cent of the time.
“The moment you have the second half, the control, you get the chances there, you hit the crossbar, you have several corners, you have blocked shots, then you need to kill it off, and then it’s disappointing to get the goal against like that.
“So with one blind ball behind the defence in no man’s land, where our defensive line was not good at that moment, but those are things to work on with new players coming into the building.”
There was just three minutes remaining when Watkins raced onto David Watson’s hooked ball in behind to prod past Jack Butland, leaving Gers with no time to respond. But Clement insists there’s a long way to go in the title race.
“We have 30 games to go, so it’s always disappointing to lose points because we want to win all the games. So we’re focused on that. There is our disappointment, and also that we cannot build on what the players did the last couple of weeks.
“For example, keeping the clean sheet, what they did in several games, creating the chances and being decisive. So we need to look at ourselves and make things better.”
The frustrated travelling support unfurled a banner demanding that “the mismanagement of Rangers stops and stops now”. But there was fresh fury at full-time, with those who stayed behind for the final whistle telling their team where to go as skipper James Tavernier and Co trudged their way over to hold up hands.
Clement said: “It’s normal that they’re unhappy. There’s not one person in the staff or one person of the players who was happy after this game, after losing.
“So that’s normal. The players showed respect towards the fans, the fans showed what they felt about the results, and that’s a normal thing. So it’s about getting back the results on the pitch, that’s the main thing to do, and then the fans go behind you.”