STEVEN GERRARD was frustrated with a mentality change from Rangers at Ibrox as the champions earned a 3-0 victory over Livingston on the opening day of the campaign.
Rangers took an early lead as Ianis Hagi scored their first goal of the new season but it took until 12 minutes from time for the win to be secured as Scott Wright finished in style.
A late effort from Kemar Roofe added a shine to the scoreline for the Light Blues as they got their title defence off and running with a comfortable win.
Rangers lacked cutting edge for large swathes of the encounter and Gerrard has pinpointed the reasons for that drop-off that allowed Livingston to settle into the Ibrox encounter.
Gerrard said: “I thought we were good in large parts, we played with a lot of control. There was very little action in our box and Jon had a relatively quiet afternoon. So I'm really pleased about that.
“From the first whistle until we got 1-0 up, we were terrific. We played with a real urgency and intensity that Livingston were struggling to cope with.
“But I thought our mentality changed from 1-0 and we complicated the game a little bit.
“Everyone was taking that extra touch which slowed it down a little bit.
“That gave Livingston a chance to breathe. From 2-0 to seeing the game out, we were fantastic again.
“So it's just that middle part where we needed to take less touches and keep finding outcomes, crosses, shots and keep testing the goalkeeper. Because I thought we came off it a little bit."
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