Rangers captain Lee McCulloch has called for some dressing-room introspection before next Saturday's crunch match with Hearts at Tynecastle.
The second-place Light Blues had a chance to put further pressure on the Championship leaders when they took on Alloa at Ibrox yesterday.
However, after gilt-edged chances were missed by Kris Boyd and David Templeton in the first half, Ally McCoist's side saw their eight-game winning run ended by the Wasps.
Although McCulloch did eventually get the breakthrough in the 72nd minute from a Lewis Macleod corner, Liam Buchanan levelled six minutes later.
In their later kick-off, Hearts beat Falkirk 2-1 away to stretch their lead at the top over Rangers to six points before their much-anticipated meeting in Gorgie next Saturday. McCulloch admitted the Ibrox players would have to take stock.
"It wasn't a normal day for us, we weren't at our normal self," said the 36-year-old. "It was bitterly disappointing to draw after going ahead.
"We didn't create as many chances in the second-half as we did in the first half and we usually score those chances so we are disappointed with that.
"We had a great clean sheet record coming into the game and that is that out the window as well. So basically, as a full team we have to have a look at ourselves. I will be watching the game again to get prepared for a massive game next week."
The home side were booed off by disgruntled fans at half-time and full-time.
Despite the lacklustre performance, McCulloch's goal should have been enough to take all three points but Rangers were stunned when the visitors, who had drawn 1-1 with the Govan side earlier in the season, struck to again deprive Rangers of two points.
The Ibrox side, almost inexplicably, were in some disarray when keeper Steve Simonsen parried a drive from Kevin Cawley before Buchanan scooped the ball high into the net from a couple of yards out.
McCulloch said: "It was a scrappy game but I thought we missed a fair amount of chances, not just the strikers, by players all over the pitch.
"We missed some chances that we would usually score so the game could have been dead and buried at half-time but it wasn't to be.
"The longer the game goes on, the more nervous you become but we got the breakthrough and then threw it away with a moment of madness.
"They broke on us, outnumbered us and got their goal back and we didn't have enough to win the game in the dying stages."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article