Rangers holding onto hurt from Celtic loss - inside sombre Auchenhowie as words of Erik Ten Hag provide comfort

Lifting the lid on the mood inside Rangers training centre 48 hours on from Celtic defeat

Any neutrals taking in the Rangers versus Dundee match this evening may feel like they are inadvertently intruding into a communal period of mourning.

Football grounds for the most part are vibrant, lively and colourful places, a carnival of optimism and expectation. The mood will likely be somewhat darker around Ibrox, however, save from perhaps the small pocket of travelling fans still holding out faint hope of European qualification.

Around the bulk of the stadium, joy and hope will be noticeable only by their absence. Even the Union Bears, the Rangers ultras group who usually provide an incessant audio backdrop to every contest regardless of what is at stake, might struggle to find much to bang their drum about.

Rangers striker Cyriel Dessers shows his anguish during the defeat at Celtic Park on Saturday.

The defeat to Celtic at the weekend not only all but ended Rangers’ prospects of regaining the championship but also captured another part of their soul as well.

Losses to Kilmarnock, Aberdeen, Motherwell and Ross County have all been damaging, of course, but it is the repeated failure to get the better of their closest rivals that has inflicted the most telling blow to their title credentials. Three defeats and a draw from four league meetings tells its own story. This is a puzzle that Rangers manager Philippe Clement and his players simply cannot solve.

There was an almost funereal air around their Auchenhowie training ground yesterday, words spoken in whispered tones and empathetic nods afforded to players, as if they had been recently bereaved, as they filed out of the building.

It is hard to imagine the atmosphere being any more uplifting inside the stadium on Tuesday evening in a match that is both meaningless and hugely significant at the same time. Trailing Celtic by six points and seven goals with just two league games left to play, you can get long odds on Rangers concluding this week as Scottish champions.

Rangers' Cyriel Dessers was managed by Erik Ten Hag during their time at FC Utrecht. Photo by Hollandse Hoogte/Shutterstock (8982322e)

Knowing that only a victory will save them from handing the title to Celtic ought to serve as sufficient motivation, even if the Rangers team – missing 11 players due to injury or suspension – will probably need to play out their final home game of the season in front of pockets of unoccupied seats as disillusioned fans elect to stay at home, still scarred by events at the weekend.

Cyriel Dessers did not try to hide his disappointment as he attempted to put into words the defeat at Celtic Park and his subsequent period of reflection. There is much to admire about the striker both as a player and, more importantly, as an individual as he spoke candidly and with emotion about seeing the title slip through Rangers’ hands at the end of a tumultuous campaign that has ebbed and flowed from the very start.

“I had a manager, Erik ten Hag, who always said that when something happens in a football game you either mourn for 24 hours or celebrate for 24 hours,” said Dessers. “And then you have to switch your mind to the next game. I thought a couple of times about these words on Saturday and Sunday.

"But when you come back into this building you switch the button and you try to forget about it. It’s not easy because it’s there, not only in your head but also in your body. I want to switch a button and find the energy and power again to go against Dundee. It’s been a little bit emotional because you know the moments you have been through in the whole season and the things you did. Unfortunately losing is also a part of football.”

Clement was typically more pragmatic as he tried to lay out what the loss to Celtic – and with it effectively the title – meant to him.

“I’ve been in football for more than 30 years,” said the manager. “This is the part of the season which is decisive, where you have the yes and the no. I’ve been on the good side a lot of times but also several times on the bad side. I know one thing. It’s about reacting.

“If we look back six months ago, If I’d talked about being in this situation probably you’d all be laughing at that moment. So there is a process done in that period. But it’s not reached until the summit so we’re going to work hard to get there.”

Rangers could yet conclude this campaign on a positive note. Their two remaining league games – they finish away to Hearts on Saturday – ought to give them sufficient opportunity to shake off the disappointment of losing the league and, perhaps more importantly, to prepare for the Scottish Cup final and another meeting with Celtic.

“Our season’s not ending,” insisted Dessers. “We worked so hard this season and in the two cups as well and we get a chance in 12 days to win the Scottish Cup final. If you take away the pain that we have now, that’s a huge opportunity for Rangers to take a trophy in an amazing fixture.

“If you can do it then in a big way then that’s what you live for. That’s what you do everything for, every day. This weekend hurt us a lot but you have to switch your mind immediately to this next opportunity.”

Clement is already looking to the future; to the Dundee match this evening, to the cup final and even to the summer and the chance to put his own stamp on the Rangers squad.

“I feel that this is a club where the board and the people in the building all want to work hard to make things better,” he added. “And things will become better.”

It was an optimistic note on an otherwise downbeat day.