JAMES TAVERNIER knows that Rangers' start to the Premiership season hasn't been perfect. 

Giovanni van Bronckhorst's men dropped points at Easter Road after going down to nine-men against Hibs. 

They also fell to a heavy 4-0 defeat at the hands of arch rivals Celtic.

Despite that though, the skipper is keen to highlight that the gap to the champions is only two-points at the summit of the league table. 

So while the Hoops have been earning praise from many, Tavernier insists the title battle is firmly still alive.

He told Rangers TV : "Obviously the first block of games, we were disappointed with the Hibs game and losing the men and taking a point there.

"The performance at Parkhead, we didn’t like that performance at all that we put in.

"But we are only two points in it in the league so there are a lot of games to play, it is still early in the season. The boys are raring to go to get it kicked off again.

"The Champions League, we wanted more out of the Ajax game, we wanted to implement our style of play, which we didn’t do. I thought we did that against Napoli and for 60 minutes we played really well.

"Then you go to ten men and it can be a struggle. We conceded three penalties, Greegsy [Allan McGregor] has done wonders to save two out, but that is football at the end of the day.

"We are relishing the task in hand and the games in hand. We are not far away.

"It is only two points and we have only played the first block of the season. There are plenty of games to play so it is down to us to keep our standards and the levels of consistency going through the games to create a real good momentum heading into the games."