Philippe Clement admitted Rangers stoked the anxiety of their own supporters with an ‘up and down’ display in a laboured 1-0 win over Hearts.
Failing to build on Cyriel Dessers’ tenth goal of the season after six minutes, the Ibrox side made heavy weather of securing the victory that saw them remain nine points behind Celtic and Aberdeen.
The substitution of midfielder Connor Barron — a star man in last Thursday’s Europa League draw with Olympiakos — resulted in boos from sections of the 48,254 crowd inside Ibrox.
Insisting the fans’ favourite needed careful management after a 5,000-mile round trip to Greece and an intense period of games, Clement defended his decision to replace the Scotland international with Nana Kasanwirjo with 20 minutes to play.
The substitute missed a chance to ease the tension when he smashed a shot off the crossbar.
‘I understand fans are fans and they don’t know all the facts,’ said Clement. ‘They see Connor as one of the symbols of this new team, and he deserves that.
There were boos around Ibrox when Clement replaced Barron with 20 minutes remaining
Clement admitted that his team’s ‘up and down’ display had made the supporters nervous
James Tavernier congratulates Cyriel Dessers on scoring the only goal against Hearts
‘I praised him a lot in the last couple of weeks but it’s also my job to manage him in a good way so he doesn’t get injuries or I overuse him.
‘He was tired with the massive distance he ran and the duels, the long travel, everything, and we could put Dujon (Sterling) in the midfield to win the duels and go forwards after that.
‘I understand fans don’t understand every detail about that, and they want to see one of the best players over the past couple of weeks, but I think the fans would be more disappointed if he was injured at the end.’
Hearts penned the home side in for long spells of the second half, with the anxiety of fans becoming progressively worse. Blaming his side’s failure to add a second goal, Clement added: ‘I don’t think (the tension) was there in the first half. There was a really good atmosphere, with the fans really positive and behind the team.
‘We make the fans nervous by making the wrong choices. They see just the one goal of a difference and, if one ball drops wrongly or there’s a mistake, then Hearts are back in the game. It’s about us doing better with the ball in those moments.
‘In the first half I saw a lot of good things, a really good goal comparable with the goal we scored in Olympiakos. We were finding the right spaces, and going from the back to the front making good combination play, good runs and scoring a good goal.
‘After that, it went up and down, with more downs than ups. We were too sloppy on the ball and not making the right choices like in the first half. Hearts came more into the game without creating good chances, but they stayed in the game.
‘We had several opportunities to score the second, so we need to take those.
‘We also hit the bar, which was a good attack. But we should have done things faster in the game, then you have a different last half hour.’