THE journalists from the daily newspapers who traipsed out to Rangers' training complex in Milngavie yesterday to speak to Ally McCoist were accommodated in a different room than usual.

Hanging on one wall inside this office was a photograph taken circa 1990 of the Rangers first-team squad at Il Ciocco, their then traditional pre-season training camp based high in the Tuscan hills. Sitting front and centre of the picture is not the manager Graeme Souness or even his assistant Walter Smith but McCoist, the club's star centre-forward. A look of contentment is spread across his face.

The current Rangers manager did not seem to notice the picture when he arrived to belatedly begin his press briefing - after all, he presumably passes through that room various times a day - but it would have been interesting had he stopped and taken the time to have a look and reminisce. Compared to his modern-day travails, it must seem like a simpler time.

McCoist's tenure as manager has always been soundtracked by murmurs of discontent from a section of the club's support regarding results, performances, signings or tactics, but the grumbles seem to be getting louder of late. Home league defeats to Hearts and Hibernian have put a dent in Rangers' chances of winning the SPFL Championship after runaway successes in the third division and then SPFL League 1, and placed McCoist's managerial record and capabilities firmly under the microscope. The man who could do little wrong as a Rangers player is inducing feelings of anger and frustration from the same supporters who used to worship him.

McCoist, publically at least, is remaining fairly sanguine about it all. After years of having to face the media to address the club's myriad off-field problems, for the first time in three years the spotlight has fallen on him. He has not enjoyed being criticised but accepts it is part of the job.

The furore will die down again should Rangers beat Livingston this afternoon, but amplify should they draw or lose to drop further behind Hearts at the top of the table. McCoist, though, has found a way to be philosophical about it all.

"I think it goes with the territory," he shrugged. "I think we have had some tough press conferences in the last three years with what has happened to the club. I understand everybody's questioning.

"I know where it is coming from and I don't have a problem with it. I wouldn't say it has spooked me or it worries me. It is part and parcel of being the Rangers manager. We just accept it and move on."

Lee Wallace, though, was not for letting his manager take all the flak. "The buck stops with us [the players] first and foremost," said the Rangers defender. "It's a collective thing between the players and management. Only a couple of times this season have we found that consistency we need and that's been the disappointing thing for me.

"We wanted to make a mark as early as we could. We wanted to be sitting top of the league and we wanted to be the team everybody is talking about. It is early in the season and that's the only positive thing. We have certainly got time and we, as players, have to start doing better on the pitch."

Not every stellar player makes the successful transition to become an outstanding manager and there is a school of thought that McCoist may be among their number. Given the unique set of circumstances in which Rangers have been operating over the past few years, even the man himself cannot say for certain. "I think there is still an unknown there," he said. "Nobody knows. But I can guarantee that if we hadn't won the league the year before or last season, then it would have been right [to say he was a bad manager] and I wouldn't have been here now. But no-one knows if winning the third division by 24 points is good. No-one knows if going through League 1 undefeated and winning it by 39 points was good.

"What we do know is that it wasn't bad. Most people would think it was acceptable, at the very worst. But it's not for me to pre-empt opinions on how good or indifferent it was.

"It's extremely difficult to say, even for ourselves, because it has never been done before. It's never had to be done before. So even in 15 or 20 years' time, we probably still won't know whether it was good, bad or indifferent."

Wallace predicted a positive reaction to the recent negative feedback. "I've got a feeling that we are being written off and the manager is being questioned. That goes with the territory but I believe that with the boys we have through there, we will be fine come the end of the season. We have to use the criticism positively.

"We know it happens and you are never going to get away from that. We are a bit more scrutinised here but we are ready for it and it is up to us to go out there and make it better."