Rangers held at lowly Berwick

Soccer: Manager Ally McCoist branded Rangers’ 1-1 draw against Berwick as “unacceptable” and “agony” to watch as his side were…

Soccer:Manager Ally McCoist branded Rangers' 1-1 draw against Berwick as "unacceptable" and "agony" to watch as his side were left still searching for their first away win in the Irn Bru Third Division. The Glasgow giants appeared to be on track for the victory at Shielfield when Andy Little claimed his seventh goal of the season on the stroke of half-time.

But the home side fought back thanks to a leveller from substitute Fraser McLaren and could have claimed the three points when Chris Townsley’s injury-time goal was disallowed for a foul in the build-up that appeared to be a debatable call by referee Mike Tumilty.

Rangers have already scraped past Brechin in extra-time in the Ramsdens Cup and drawn with Peterhead on the road this season, and the message from McCoist was loud and clear. He said: “Outside the game and the draw, I can’t tell you how disappointed I am with the overall performance.

“That performance is absolutely miles short, I can’t tell you how far short that was of what any Rangers supporter or manager or coach would expect from the team. I’ve told the players that. It was just unacceptable what we got today.

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“You would struggle to find any of the boys to give pass marks to today, that’s how poor I felt we were today. There’s a lot of hard work to be done. I’m up for it and, I tell you right now, they will be too because I’ll make sure of it. We will go through it and watch it because that was agony — and I’ll make sure they watch it again.”

Despite being forced to settle for a point, when his side could have snatched a famous victory, Berwick boss Ian Little had no complaints about the outcome. He said: “I wouldn’t say I was disappointed. With 10 minutes to go, at 1-1, you would be jumping through hoops for that.

“I didn’t see much wrong with it at the end and I haven’t seen it again on television. But disappointed that we didn’t take the three points? Not really. I was really pleased with the way we played.”