A FUTURE filled with £30m rebuilding plans and European-calibre players seemed like some way away at Ibrox yesterday. As the rain tumbled down incessantly, a crowd of 22,369 watched with increased frustration as Rangers toiled for spells against a limited St Mirren side before eventually easing into the Petrofac Training Cup final where they will face League One side Peterhead on April 10. These are not the sort of occasions referred to by chairman Dave King at Friday’s AGM as he spoke of prosperous days ahead but it is where Rangers are at the moment. To reach this promise of a brighter future, they first must muddle through what is, at times, a fairly humdrum present.

And muddle through they did to give themselves another chance of lifting a trophy that has thus far eluded their grasp during this sojourn through the lower leagues. In the end it was a fairly comfortable victory but there was a brief spell early in the second half when St Mirren, toothless before that but still only a goal behind, threatened to make life difficult. When Stuart Carswell struck the crossbar, however, the feeling was that the visitors’ chance may have come and gone. That proved to be the case as Rangers ran in three more goals to provide Mark Warburton with his first final as manager to look forward to.

“In the first half we were really good and, in a very respectful way, we should have come in more than one up at half-time,” he said. “We had a lot of chances, moved the ball, and dominated possession. The second half was not quite as good. We had a 15-minute spell where we were sloppy and gave the ball away but it was pleasing at the end.”

When Rangers played Raith Rovers in the final of this competition two seasons ago, the grumbles were that Easter Road’s 20,000-capacity was not big enough to accommodate demand. Warburton was confident this time it will be at the national stadium.

“I hope it’s at Hampden,” he added. “That’s what I’ve been told and I hope that’s the case. I think Rangers will send a very strong support there and I’m looking forward to that type of challenge.”

This was another difficult afternoon for St Mirren and their beleaguered manager Ian Murray whose midweek claim to know more about football than the fans who follow the team is beginning to look increasingly like the sort of gaffe that comes back to haunt a manager. This was a sixth match in a row without a victory, adding extra pressure ahead of what could be a pivotal home game against Queen of the South next weekend.

“Our quality with the ball was as bad as it’s been all season,” admitted Murray. “It was really, really poor which is disappointing because we have good players who can pass it. But for whatever reason – maybe it was because it was a semi-final, or just being at Ibrox – some of our good player couldn’t even trap the ball. They couldn’t pass the ball literally five yards.”

For 34 minutes it looked, however, as if St Mirren’s unintentional rope-a-dope tactics might actually work for them. The plan seemed to be to let Rangers have near permanent ownership of the ball, not press them, let them shoot repeatedly on their goal and hope Jamie Langfield could continue to thwart the home team with save after save. It didn’t seem the shrewdest strategy in the world but for a while it had the desired effect, as the goalkeeper repelled everything Rangers could throw at him, thwarting Gedion Zelalem, Lee Wallace, Barrie McKay and, most impressively, Kenny Miller. When Langfield was finally beaten, Sean Kelly covered for him by somehow clearing Waghorn’s shot off the line.

It seemed highly unlikely, however, that St Mirren could get away with such passive tactics for 90 minutes and eventually their resistance was broken. Andy Halliday scooped a pass forward to Jason Holt and with the St Mirren defence appealing desperately for offside, he had time to take a touch and thread a shot beyond Langfield. Rangers were finally in front and St Mirren – who had offered next to nothing in an attacking sense – needed a Plan B.

The visitors were brighter in the second half, causing slight palpitations to pulse through the crowd, but three late goals saw Rangers through. Waghorn crossed for Miller to tap in his first goal since August before the Englishman waltzed around some half-hearted tackles to finish for Rangers’ third. St Mirren’s misery was completed in the final minute when Kelly turned Dean Shiels’ cross into his own net.