'It better change': Barry Ferguson demands better from Rangers as they prepare for Celtic

Barry Ferguson has told his Rangers players that things had “better change” as he demanded more from his team when they face Celtic in the Old Firm derby next season.

Ferguson was clearly unhappy with his side after they let a lead slip twice in their 2-2 draw at St Mirren last weekend, bemoaning the fact that players weren’t following his instructions.

The former Ibrox captain said he’s had further talks with players this week and made his expectations clear as well as detailing exactly what riled him about the previous performance. Now, he’s expecting a reaction as Rangers face their rivals.

“It better change, and it has to change,” Ferguson said. “That’s something, again, we spoke about as a group, that’s something that I wasn’t happy with.

“It’s clear, you’ve seen that after the game. Again, we’ve been through a lot this week and I expect them to take the information on.

“There was a lot of frustration for a number of reasons, because I wasn’t happy with the way the game went. Again, we’ve had a full week, we’ve spent a bit of time going through certain scenarios that I wasn’t happy with. We’ve still got another day to go, we’ll do a lot more work tomorrow, but they’re clear on what I wasn’t happy with. That needs to improve and I expect a big improvement on Sunday.”

Ferguson enjoyed success in his first derby as interim boss, guiding his team to a 3-2 victory at Celtic Park in March but he doesn’t think that will have any bearing on this match. And he said that in a game this big, only the final score will matter.

“I couldn’t care less about the performance,” he said. “I just want to get three points. It’s a bonus for me if you play well in the games.

“I don’t tend to look what happened in the past. That (previous win) was a number of weeks ago and I’ll expect the same level, if not better in Sunday.”

As a former captain of the club, Ferguson admitted that winning the game is important to him but he said his job is to make sure that it holds as much importance to everyone else, even if the league title has already been settled.

“It’s been a really disappointing season but it’s not a dead rubber,” he said.

“You are coming up against your fiercest rivals who again have dominated this season. That hurts.

“So we need to go up against them and give them a reminder that we’re going to be here next season.

“We need to challenge, certainly in a better manner than which we have done this season.”