THE upper tiers of the Copland Road and Broomloan ends closed off, entire blocks of seats virtually empty in other sections:

it wasn't difficult to imagine Mike Ashley and Derek Llambias eyeing up all that Ibrox acreage last night and thinking "some giant Sports Direct logos would look good there", the way undertakers measure a corpse to select the appropriate size of coffin.

Maybe that's a cheap jibe, maybe it does a disservice to the as-yet-unexpressed plan Ashley and his right-hand man have for Rangers. No-one knows what Ashley has in store for Rangers but what was abundantly clear in an eerie Ibrox last night was that he is being seen as the least exciting billionaire in football. It wasn't long ago when a high-roller interested in Rangers would have been carried shoulder high down Edmiston Drive.

But what big words "interested in Rangers" are. Ashley is perceived as being interested in Sports Direct and making money, and not necessarily in that order.

A protest against, well, pretty much everything at Rangers drew a poor turnout at the main entrance before the game and the mood of the broad support is diverse. Plenty are happy to give Ashley a quiet, cautious welcome. The critics are far more vocal and suspect he'll do at Rangers what he's done at Newcastle. Under Ashley, Sports Direct logos take hold of a football ground like Japanese knotweed.

In this, the first home game since he effectively bought his way into power, the turnout was pitiful, just 13,023. Record books were being thumbed to figure out when Rangers last played a home game to such a sparse attendance. The answer was two months ago. Almost 2,000 fewer showed up against Clyde. This was a cup quarter-final, though, and a rare crack against a top-flight team.

A "sack the board" chant went up in the 18th minute and a "Forever Ibrox" banner emerged, alluding to the belief that the auld ground itself will be renamed after Ashley's shops. "There's only one Mike Ashley" the St Johnstone support mocked in reply. Otherwise there was nothing. No reference to Ashley, none to Llambias or the Easdales. Those who turned up seemed to want to watch a game of football.

When St Johnstone's Murray Davidson was stretchered off there was sympathetic applause from all round the ground. When Lewis Macleod scored the late winner Rangers fans celebrated like they didn't have a care in the world.

The pre-match protest didn't draw any numbers. Only a few dozen fans gathered with a banner which said "Sons of Struth say enough is enough, give us our club back".

The sentiment was heartfelt but the Sons of Struth's membership is a lot bigger than that and you wonder how many are now seeing the fight as a lost cause.

They wanted Dave King or Brian Kennedy and got Ashley and (still) the Easdales. The Sons of Struth tried to put the squeeze on Ashley by organising flashmob protests at some Sports Direct branches earlier this month. His response?

He stumped up another £2m to burrow ever deeper into Rangers.

The larger supporters' group, Union of Fans, fired off another of its broadsides with a statement before the game. The language was strong. The plc board had neglected its duties, they said. The support and the club had been betrayed. The decision to go with Ashley in preference to the King or Kennedy offers was "an absolute disgrace". Directors had been cowardly and been "bullied" by Ashley and Sandy Easdale. Rangers were at the mercy of "corporate vultures".

The statement acknowledged, carefully, that plenty of fellow supporters might not share their view. "It is now a matter of individual conscience for fans if they wish to continue to fund the corporate pillaging of our football club. They should be under no illusions however that every time they purchase a single item in either Sports Direct or our club shops, they are paying for the privilege of allowing Mike Ashley to strengthen his grip on our commercial operations in a move which could hamstring the club for a generation.

"Also for the remainder of this season, every match ticket they buy will be used to pay Mr Ashley back the money he has lent for control of our club. Effectively they will be paying him for the privilege of his power grab."

Their contempt for Sandy Easdale, the chairman of the football board, deepened yesterday when he was quoted claiming ignorance about why Llambias was on the premises. "I don't know who he is here on behalf of," said Easdale. "I just said hello to the guy in the corridor."

Just a couple of guys passing in a corridor, nothing to see here. On Monday Llambias had said he was in Glasgow to apply for the chief executive position. By yesterday he was already on the club's payroll as a consultant. He spent the day with Sports Direct's head of retail brands, Barry Leach, and Rangers directors before taking one of those empty seats to watch the game.

Oddly enough, for all the hostility Newcastle fans have shown Ashley and, while he was there, Llambias, the pair of them know how to keep people coming. They offered ticket deals and reductions. Crowds there are still around the 50,000 mark and no wonder when the cheapest tickets cost only £15.

Doubtless Llambias will have a similar idea after watching this last night, although if they end up facing Celtic in the semi-finals he could charge what he likes.

As for Ashley, he wasn't there, which meant he had something in common with most of the Rangers support after all.