'A team needs an edge', warns Walter Smith as he voices fear over complacency

Rangers were some way short of being considered champions-elect. Kaunas had put paid to their European ambitions at the first hurdle, while the Ibrox side were also trailing Celtic in the league. The final straw for Rangers fans was the acceptance of a bid from Birmingham City for top goalscorer Kris Boyd. It prompted the unfurling of a "David Murray must go" banner in Perth, and a subsequent campaign, orchestrated by the Rangers Supporters Trust, which operated under the slogan "We deserve better". Over 14 months later, Murray is still there, as is Boyd. And though the club remains in an uncertain financial situation, from these unpromising conditions manager Walter Smith has helped guide the club to the brink of a second successive league title.

He yesterday reflected on both the difficulty in ensuring an edge remains present within the team and also the turnaround since January 2009, when there was even talk the club was about to go into administration. Smith accepted that the need to maintain high standards is par for the course for the Old Firm but recalled the disappointment felt at the time of the clash with St Johnstone in January last year, despite the 2-0 victory.

Even now, he retains a fire. He began yesterday's briefing by firmly pointing out that despite comments to the contrary, he had only left out two first-team players in last week's Scottish Cup defeat to Dundee United, not the six or seven he had been accused of. Madjid Bougherra and Kirk Broadfoot were both injured, and remain on the sidelines tonight. Steven Davis was ill, while Kevin Thomson and Lee McCulloch were both suspended. "I am responsible for leaving out (Kenny] Miller and (Kris] Boyd, the rest is not quite as straightforward as people are saying," Smith explained. But such ill-informed opinion is what he has come to expect. Last season's fan unrest at St Johnstone – although far from a mass protest – falls into this category.

"It is just what surrounds Rangers and Celtic," he said. "That aspect is always there. As I stressed the other day, Scottish football is a much harder environment to work in than people realise. That's for everybody: managers, players, the whole lot. I did say at the time, when that banner went up, that I was disappointed in that. People can have any kind of assessment they want about the current Rangers team, but I don't think they have let people down in terms of their effort, their application and their desire to do well for the club. That goes all the way through from management down to players."

Those Rangers supporters active in this protest were more concerned with the club's financial state, although many were still raw after a home defeat to Celtic at the end of the year. But just two domestic losses since that day – and no further Old Firm defeats – have delivered Rangers to the point where they can anticipate a second successive league title being secured in mid-April, or even sooner. Smith, however, is not one of those doing the anticipating.

"It brings a tension of its own," he reflected. "It is not often a team, any team, gets circumstances like this. When I took over, three years ago, Celtic had that gap. They were never in danger of giving up the championship and were probably further ahead than we are now, but they dropped a number of points in the run-in.

"I read this morning Celtic's new manager 'will have to wrestle the championship from Rangers'. That in itself is a very strange comment because we have not won it yet. That attitude and that viewpoint could be a danger, it is one of the biggest dangers.

"A team needs an edge," he continued. "Tony Mowbray said they (Celtic] needed to keep winning to put an element of doubt into Rangers' heads. I think that element of doubt is necessary in any team.The circumstances we are in at the present moment, where everybody assumes we have won the championship, is in my mind the biggest danger."

There are ways and means to motivate players who might fall prey to casualness, even unconsciously.

But Smith can also rely on the desire of his own players to prove themselves. Steven Naismith is one who is relishing the chance to start his second game in four days, having scored twice in the 4-1 defeat of Hearts on Saturday. "The buzz of getting back in over the last week and feeling I've been able to contribute has been good enough for me," said Naismith.

"But we need to keep doing it," he added. "We can't really carry any passengers. We want to go out and win every game and win the league as soon as possible."