GERRARD WARNING AS RANGERS SLIP AGAIN
STEVEN GERRARD insists his Rangers side can wave goodbye to their title hopes if they repeat their Livingston horror show in a match that had to be halted temporarily after an assistant referee was struck by an object thrown from the crowd. Official Calum Spence, who was standing in front of the away fans, was treated for a cut to the back of his head before carrying on for the remaining half an hour of the game. The Ibrox boss afterwards admitted his side could have played all day and not found the net at the Tony Macaroni Arena. Dolly Menga’s goal gave Gary Holt’s brave side a shock win as Rangers slide down to sixth spot in the Ladbrokes Premiership and now trail table-topping Hearts by eight points only seven games into the season. The Tynecastle men visit Ibrox next Sunday and Gerrard has now issued a stark warning to his misfiring squad. ‘Hearts was a must-win game whether we won, drew or lost today,’ he said. ‘They are the team to chase, they have come out of the blocks flying. ‘It is still early on in the season so we can recover from a result like this, like we recovered from the Old Firm loss. But this can’t keep happening. When we come and play teams like Livingston we have to try and take maximum points, otherwise we won’t be in the title race.’ Rangers dominated possession but Livingston did much more with the possession they had. Menga smashed home seven minutes before the interval and while Rangers huffed and puffed after the break, they played into the hosts’ hands with a string of misplaced passes. Gerrard added: ‘We were nowhere near good enough in the final third. We could be playing for another 180 minutes and wouldn’t look like scoring. So we have to take the criticism when we don’t perform.’