A DARREN McGregor header with just eight minutes remaining at Ibrox last night has given Rangers the slightest sliver of hope they can stage a comeback in the SPFL Premiership play-off final with Motherwell and clinch promotion.

The Glasgow club's chances of securing a place in the top flight of Scottish football appeared to have disintegrated completely when they fell three goals behind inside the first 47 minutes of this first leg tie.

Lee Erwin and Stephen McManus struck in the first half and when Lionel Ainsworth netted early on in the second to put the visitors 3-0 ahead there looked to be only one possible outcome in both the fixture and the double header.

However, interim manager Stuart McCall made three substitutions in rapid succession and his team, slowly but surely, hauled their way back into the match. The reward for their tenacity came when McGregor netted from a Nicky Law corner in in the 82nd minute.

It will still take a colossal effort in the second leg at Fir Park on Sunday for Rangers to prevail and, having been comfortably the second best side to Motherwell for lengthy spells last night, it is still highly doubtful they can recover.

Their objective will also be complicated by the fact that their scorer McGregor, who was last week voted the Rangers Player of the Season, will be suspended after picking up his sixth booking of the season and crossing the disciplinary points threshold in the second leg of the quarter-final against Queen of the South.

The absence of the former Cowdenbeath and St. Mirren man, who has formed a solid partnership in the centre of the backline alongside Marius Zaliukas in the last month, now poses a quandary for his manager.

Who does he replace him with? Lee McCulloch has fallen from favour after playing poorly and being booed by his own side's supporters in a 2-2 draw with Falkirk in a Championship game at Ibrox last month.

The club captain came back against Hibs at Easter Road on Saturday and helped his side progress. But question marks remain about the 37-year-old's fitness and reliability at the end of a draining campaign.

The alternative is to bring back the mercurial Bilel Mohsni. The Tunisian internationalist is not the sort of individual you can depend on in a pre-season friendly never mind a game the future wellbeing of the entire club hinges on.

If Rangers struggle defensively at home against the side that finished second bottom in the Premiership with their first choice rearguard available then how will they fare when a replacement is drafted in?

McCall made just one change to the starting line-up that took to the field in the second leg of the play-off semi-final last night. McCulloch, who had lined up as one of three centre backs through in the capital in a 3-5-2 formation, dropped to the bench and Nicky Clark handed a start in the 4-2-3-1 his manager favours at home.

Ian Baraclough, meanwhile, sprang something of a surprise by naming Ainsworth ahead of Conor Grant, who has started more regularly in the final weeks of the campaign, in a positive Motherwell starting line-up.

Elsewhere, Baraclough brought back his most experienced charges Stevie Hammell, Keith Lasley, Scott McDonald, McManus and Stephen Pearson having rested them in the final SPFL Championship match against Partick Thistle at the weekend.

The visitors set out to contain their hosts and try to grab something on the counter attack. Their game plan worked to perfection. As had been expected, Rangers enjoyed the majority of possession in the early stages, but could find no way through opponents who were content to sit back and soak up pressure.

Kenny Miller carved the home team's best scoring chance early on in the game after he received the ball from and nutmegged Lasley. The striker curled a decent attempt at goal from 25 yards out only to see it drift narrowly wide.

Motherwell took the lead against the run of play in 27 minutes. They broke upfield and Erwin shrugged aside the attentions of Zaliukas before unleashing a shot at goal. Rangers keeper Cammy Bell appeared to have covered until McGregor swung a leg at it rashly and diverted the ball into his own net.

Rangers fell further behind 13 minutes later when Lee Wallace brought down Scott McDonald and conceded a free-kick on the edge of his penalty box. Marvin Johnson stepped up and whipped a fine dead ball delivery in to the area to McManus whose glancing header ended up nestling in the back of the net.

There were other opportunities Motherwell could have taken. Their opponents, who played just one player up front against rivals who positioned holding midfielder Lasley in front of a deep-lying back four, struggled to carve out a meaningful opening.

Any hopes Rangers harboured of dragging themselves back into proceedings as they returned to the field for the second half appeared to be extinguished just two minutes after the restart. Erwin supplied Ainsworth and the winger drilled an unstoppable shot low past Bell.

McCall desperately needed to make changes to salvage something from a game which was slipping away from his side and did so. Tom Walsh took over from the anonymous Dean Shiels, Kris Boyd replaced the similarly disappointing Clark and Shane Ferguson came on for Zaliukas to make his debut.

The substitutions made a huge difference. Boyd was unlucky to have downward header blocked by Motherwell keeper George Long from close range in 73 minutes after getting on the end of a Richard Foster cross. When McGregor scored it had been coming.

It may not be enough for Rangers to salvage anything, but it will certainly make the rematch interesting.