RANGERS caretaker manager Graeme Murty claimed he could not afford to think about his own prospects after Hamilton secured their first league victory at Ibrox since 1926.
Murty was given the chance to claim a third consecutive victory, but second-half goals from former Rangers winger David Templeton and Darren Lyon consigned his men to a 2-0 home defeat.
Pedro Caixinha was sacked after failing to achieve a hat-trick of wins during seven months in charge and Murty emerged as one of the favourites to succeed him after being trusted with the team for the second time this year.
Rangers previously declared they would draw up a shortlist after this week, but Murty would not comment on whether the Ladbrokes Premiership defeat would harm his chances.
“It will or it won’t,” he said. “I can’t really have a thought about that. That’s just noise around our performance.
“What we managed to do is get the players focused and ready for the performance. The performance didn’t give us the three points. That’s all I can worry about and I’m going to look on Monday and make sure, if I’m in post, the players learn the lessons from this and that they get a good week’s training and go and put things right.”
Alfredo Morelos missed a string of chances as he extended his goal drought to nine matches, and Templeton opened the scoring after Ross McCrorie’s misplaced pass two minutes into the second half.
Lyon netted on the break with 10 minutes remaining and even then Rangers missed a series of chances, with the majority of the home support gone by the time Accies defender Alex Gogic received a second yellow card in stoppage-time.
Morelos looks a player short in confidence, but Murty said: “You’d have to ask Alfredo because, when you see him in training, he knocks them in for fun.
“We have to keep believing in the players and what we are trying to do and, candidly, I still can’t believe we didn’t get a goal. I think if we had got a goal, momentum would have swung back in our favour and you would have seen a different mentality and quality to our play.”
Hamilton manager Martin Canning feels their win can be a shot in the arm after they were recently victims of a fraud that is understood to have cost them about £900,000.
“It can be and the owner came in and spoke to the boys afterwards and said the same thing,” said Canning, whose team are now unbeaten in four games. “That’s the kind of thing that does keep you going.
“It keeps those guys going as well when they have lost a lot of money. They have got to keep the club going and doing what they do and days like today hopefully reinforce that and make it special for everyone.”
It was 30 years ago when Accies last beat Rangers in any competition – Adrian Sprott went down in club folklore for his Scottish Cup winner at Ibrox – and Canning was delighted for both goalscorers.
“I’m so pleased for young Darren Lyon as well to get himself a goal at Ibrox,” he sa
“What we managed to do is get the players focused and ready for the performance. The performance didn’t give us the three points. That’s all I can worry about and I’m going to look on Monday and make sure, if I’m in post, the players learn the lessons from this and that they get a good week’s training and go and put things right.”
Alfredo Morelos missed a string of chances as he extended his goal drought to nine matches, and Templeton opened the scoring after Ross McCrorie’s misplaced pass two minutes into the second half.
Lyon netted on the break with 10 minutes remaining and even then Rangers missed a series of chances, with the majority of the home support gone by the time Accies defender Alex Gogic received a second yellow card in stoppage-time.
Morelos looks a player short in confidence, but Murty said: “You’d have to ask Alfredo because, when you see him in training, he knocks them in for fun.
“We have to keep believing in the players and what we are trying to do and, candidly, I still can’t believe we didn’t get a goal. I think if we had got a goal, momentum would have swung back in our favour and you would have seen a different mentality and quality to our play.”
Hamilton manager Martin Canning feels their win can be a shot in the arm after they were recently victims of a fraud that is understood to have cost them about £900,000.
“It can be and the owner came in and spoke to the boys afterwards and said the same thing,” said Canning, whose team are now unbeaten in four games. “That’s the kind of thing that does keep you going.
“It keeps those guys going as well when they have lost a lot of money. They have got to keep the club going and doing what they do and days like today hopefully reinforce that and make it special for everyone.”
It was 30 years ago when Accies last beat Rangers in any competition – Adrian Sprott went down in club folklore for his Scottish Cup winner at Ibrox – and Canning was delighted for both goalscorers.
“I’m so pleased for young Darren Lyon as well to get himself a goal at Ibrox,” he said. “He was at Rangers as well, obviously Temps was, so it’s two ex-Rangers players coming back and scoring goals, which is great for us.”
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