Rangers nudged their perfect league record along another notch on Wednesday night but an 11th successive win came at a cost.

Andy Little will not play again this year after breaking his jaw and cheekbone in a challenge with Dunfermline Athletic's Alex Whittle, the Northern Irishman posting a fairly graphic photo of his swollen face on his Twitter page as he awaits surgery. He is expected to be out for several months. Richard Foster left Ibrox on crutches after sustaining an ankle injury, while Lee McCulloch required six stitches in a head wound after a collision with Jordan Moore, who was later sent off.

Ally McCoist had warned his players to expect a physical encounter with the only other full-time team in SPFL League 1 and the Rangers manager later expressed his dissatisfaction at the visitors' approach. Nicky Law, however, felt the 3-1 win showed the league leaders could cope with some rough stuff and still emerge victorious. The gap to Ayr United in second is 14 points.

"I think you could tell they are full-time due to the difference in their fitness levels," said Law. "It wasn't pretty but that was probably more to do with Dunfermline. We give them a lot of credit for the way they were set up. Where most teams sit in, they pressed us. They were a young team with lots of energy and they got in amongst us with a few tasty challenges. We can take heart that we managed to grind it out and get the three points.

"The manager said if you want to win leagues you have to win ugly sometimes. We weren't great, but Dunfermline made it really difficult and teams are going to do that. Everyone wants you to win 5-0 or 6-0 but it won't be like that every week."

Law agreed with his manager that Moore, a Dundee United loanee, had been fortunate to have only received a yellow card for his challenge on McCulloch. "We feel the first one is a sending off," said the midfielder. "The ref said he didn't swing with his elbow, he's led with his arm, but if I lead with my arm, I don't give someone six or seven stitches around their eye. It was a really bad one and we felt he could have gone, but there is nothing we can do. There were two or three of those; they really got stuck in."

Rangers, again, were slow to warm up, failing to score in the first half for a fourth successive game. Law had his own theory on why that might be. "At the start of the season, teams were matching us with 4-4-2 and the games were open, which we feel plays into our hands because we had more space. But teams aren't doing that now because we were scoring four, five, six goals; they are now sitting in and making it difficult for us. You can't always break them down in the first 45 or 60 minutes, so we need to be patient. But we feel with our fitness levels and the players we have got, the game will stretch and we have the players who can hurt teams.

"We know we have to stay patient and not panic. The expectation levels are so high here; if you're not 1-0 or 2-0 up within 15 minutes, the fans start to get panic and get on your back. So it makes it difficult. But we're pleased that we've come through and showed we have another side to our game."

The prospect of Rangers going through the season with a perfect record grows with every win. Law, though, insisted it was not a topic for conversation in the dressing room. "There are still so many games to play and anything can happen, so it's not something we've spoken about. It's just game by game and keep chalking the victories up as we go. That's 11 league wins in a row, which is a great achievement of which we are really, really proud and we are looking to make it 12 on Saturday."