Smith wants Rangers to hone killer instinct

Rangers manager Walter Smith says he is not worried by his side's failure to kill off games early on after his side's narrow 2-1 win over St Mirren on Saturday.

The Ibrox club dominated the match but their many misses in front of goal came back to haunt them as a late strike from St Mirren set up a nervy finish.

The Rangers gaffer knows his side cannot afford to drop many more points in the race for the championship after their midweek goalless draw with Motherwell saw them slip further behind fierce rivals Celtic at the top of the Scottish Premier League.

But Smith says it would be more worrying if his side was not creating chances in games and is confident that his side will become more clinical as the season goes on.

“It would be more of a problem if we were not creating any opportunities,” Smith said.

“We continue to create plenty of opportunities in our games and I think that is the main thing more than anything else. We can only continue to create them and if we do then we are confident we will go on and win games.

“I would certainly hope that we will become a little bit more clinical in front of goal as the season progresses.”

And Smith said the Ibrox club's fans might be seeing more of Lee McCulloch in the centre of defence after he partnered David Weir there in the match against St Mirren.

“He is a versatile enough player. He can play up front and in midfield as well,” Smith said.

“He has been playing in the reserve team at centre-half. Obviously he has still to pick up a lot of the things that are required there but I think he has the attributes to play in that position.”

At Ibrox on Saturday Rangers survived a late scare to close the gap with league leaders Celtic to just one point as they defeated St Mirren 2-1 at Ibrox as Kris Boyd scored his 150th career goal.

With their Old Firm rivals not playing until Sunday Rangers knew they could put the pressure on Celtic with a win in their Scottish Premier League clash with the Buddies.

They did so thanks to a selfless shift from Scottish striker Kenny Miller who set-up both Boyd and Steven Davis to score but couldn't get the goal his display merited, with a candidate for miss of the season amongst his many chances.

Rangers took the lead after just four minutes when Boyd scored his tenth league goal of the season and the 150th of his career. The striker headed down a pass to Miller who laid it off for Boyd to unleash a fierce low drive from the edge of the box past the helpless Mark Howard.

Rangers doubled their lead in the 10th minute when Davis finished off a flowing passing movement involving Miller again. Kirk Broadfoot's cutback found Miller at the edge of the box and he played a perfectly weighted first-time pass into the path of Davis who sidefooted it into the bottom left-hand corner.

Rangers came out in the second-half determined to add to their tally and captain Barry Ferguson came close in the 50th minute when his curling shot from six yards was deflected wide.

Miller then missed a spectacular chance to score in the 52nd minute. He beat Howard to a long ball and rounded the keeper outside the box but he then blazed the ball over the bar when it looked easier to score.

St Mirren scored completely against the run of play through Franco Miranda in the 81st minute. The defender collected the ball on the left-hand side of the box and curled a shot round Allan McGregor.

Craig Dargo came close with a curling free-kick with three minutes remaining but McGregor beat it away to secure the points for Rangers.