WHETHER you win, lose or draw a game of football, it is always important to look at the bigger picture. That is what Mark Warburton will be doing after the 3-1 defeat to St Johnstone on Tuesday night.

It is not a warning for Mark and he certainly won’t overreact. You don’t get too high when you win and you don’t get too low when you lose.

Mark and the players will keep a sense of perspective here. We know Rangers still have a bit to go before we are ready to challenge for the Premiership title and that fact wouldn’t have changed even if we had won at Ibrox.

I thought in the first 10, 15 minutes we did ok and we were the better side but once St Johnstone scored they dominated the game and deserved to win it.

It brings Rangers, and the fans, back down to earth a bit. It has been a terrific start to the season and Tuesday night was a real disappointment for everyone.

But I would agree with Mark when he said that there isn’t that big a gap between the top of the Championship and most of the teams in the Premiership. Unfortunately for Rangers, they couldn’t prove it on Tuesday.

They didn’t play that well and they came up against a side that did on the night. I thought St Johnstone thoroughly deserved to win and you have to give them credit for the way they set up and played. They were quick on the break and Rangers just couldn’t cope at times unfortunately.

We only really started to pose a threat after James Tavernier scored and we had a wee spell where, if we had scored again, it would have made it really interesting.

Martyn Waghorn had a good chance with a header but Rangers couldn’t get themselves back into the game. It just didn’t happen for us on the night and overall St Johnstone were the better side.

St Johnstone haven’t had a great start in the Premiership but they came to Ibrox for a cup tie, to play in front of a good crowd, and they were always going to up their game.

It is a disappointment for Rangers but it is not the be all and end all. At the start of the season, the aim was to get out of the Championship and that is still the case.

At a club like Rangers, of course you are expected to challenge for cups and win silverware. It would have been great if we could have done it this season but the only thing that really matters is getting back to the Premiership.

Mark will have sat down with the players and went over the game again and he will know where they went wrong at both ends of the park.

Managers will have watched a lot of Rangers this season so they know how they play, what their strengths are and what their weaknesses are. If you can stop them going forward, you have a chance of getting a result.

If you sit off Rangers and allow them to come at you, then you are in trouble. But if you keep it tight, get in about them and stop them passing and defend well, then you have a chance on the counter-attack.

Rangers have to find a way to combat that and they need to be quicker in the final third. They had a lot of possession on Tuesday night but lost the game 3-1.

Possession is not everything, it is what you do with it that counts. When you are facing a side that is defending well, it is hard to break them down.

That is the challenge for Rangers now, though. They need to be a bit quicker in the final third, the passing has to be a bit sharper than it has been in the last couple of weeks.

There is still some work to be done for Rangers but I don’t think Tuesday will be a wake-up call for Mark. He knows what he still has to do and what is needed.

You have to remember that this is a completely new team working under a new manager and I don’t think anyone expected them to have the start they have had, or to be playing the kind of football they are.

Overall, Rangers have done really well so far this season. The St Johnstone game was a different kind of test for them and a chance for them to beat a team from the Premiership.

But, if you look back to last season, we beat them 1-0 thanks to a Lewis Macleod goal. This team is a far better one than the side that played that night.

There will be no over-reaction from Mark or the players here. They were beaten by a side that played better than them on the night.

They will take it all on board and then go out and look to improve when we face Morton on Sunday aiming to extend their winning run in the Championship.