St Mirren's Conor McMenamin celebratesSNS

Conor McMenamin (right) scored St Mirren's second equaliser

Highlights: St Mirren 2-2 Rangers

26/04/25

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Clive Lindsay
BBC Sport Scotland

Barry Ferguson admitted opponents "don't fear playing Rangers" any more as they were left without a win in five matches after drawing with St Mirren on the day that Celtic officially clinched the Scottish Premiership title.

Rangers' interim head coach had urged his side to respond to the hurt of failing to mount a title challenge by winning their final five games.

But, despite Cyriel Dessers and Nicolas Raskin putting Rangers ahead in each half, they were quickly pegged back twice by Mark O'Hara and Conor McMenamin.

"When you speak to them individually and as a group and you ask them to do things and they don't do it, what is the point?" Ferguson told BBC Sport Scotland.

"That's the thing that frustrates me.

"The issue I've got is people don't fear playing Rangers now. Whether that's at home or away, they enjoy coming to Ibrox.

"And then, when you go away from home, teams look to see if they can bully you, run hard at you and get in about you."

Ferguson had been hoping to impress enough to secure the job on a permanent basis but has won just four of his 11 games in charge.

Errors by centre-back John Souttar and goalkeeper Liam Kelly presented St Mirren captain O'Hara and Mikael Mandron with early opportunities to open the scoring, while Dessers blasted wildly over at the other end.

Dessers made amends when Rangers took the lead with their first flowing move, the striker collecting Raskin's low pass, turning his marker and firing low past goalkeeper Zach Hemming.

However, when a long throw-in deflected into O'Hara's path, the midfielder swept it home from 15 yards.

Rangers were back in the lead after the break when Raskin gathered Diomande's pass and poked a low drive past Hemming from the edge of the penalty box.

St Mirren should have been back level when Souttar again dallied on the ball, Phillips' backheel put Roland Idowu in the clear, but his shot came off Kelly's legs.

The equaliser eventually came when Declan John's low cross was turned into the net by the sliding McMenamin.

St Mirren defy budgets again

That St Mirren went into this game looking to defeat Rangers three times in a single league campaign for the first time since 1979-80 was an indication of how well Stephen Robinson's side have done this season.

They had won their last two home league games, scoring eight goals in the process, with a 3-2 win over Ross County overtaking Hearts to secure a top-six finish.

However, top scorer Toyosi Olusanya has since been sold to Houston Dynamo and, handed the chance to prove himself a worthy replacement, Mandron failed to make his mark.

This St Mirren are a team built on team-work, however, and others stood up when it counted to secure another impressive point.

Another blow to Ferguson's hopes

Rangers' away form has been a bright spot amid some gloomy moments this season, but they were unable to make it seven Premiership wins on the road.

Ferguson looked increasingly frustrated on the sidelines as their inability to dominate lesser equipped opponents was again on full display.

Perhaps conscious of the tight pitch, Ferguson had dropped in-form Vaclav Cerny and Ianis Hagi to the bench, but the result was a disjoined and error-strewn display.

A team that went toe-to-toe with Athletic Bilbao in the Europa League played like strangers and were in danger of losing back-to-back league visits to Paisley for the first time since April 1986.

Celtic's emphatic win at Dundee United earlier in the day was yet another example of the gap between the sides - now 17 points - and the draw in Paisley does little for Ferguson's hopes of staying team boss beyond the end of the season.

It was further proof that whoever does get the job has a major task on their hands next season.

What they said

St Mirren manager Stephen Robinson: "We are disappointed we didn't win with the number of chances we had. That perhaps shows how far we've come.

"We played some terrific football. If you look at the disparity of the resources of the two clubs, there weren't many people who could have told the difference today."

Rangers interim head coach Barry Ferguson: "Not good enough. I know it is a difficult place to come, but when you take the lead twice, you need to maintain that.

"That's been a problem all season and that's the reason we've not been challenging. You can do as much work on the training ground and say as many things in meetings, but sloppy goals have been our Achilles heel, not just since I've come in."

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