Furious fans again turned on Russell Martin after a 2-0 defeat to Hearts at Ibrox left Rangers still looking for their first Premiership win after five games.
There were nine minutes on the clock when home supporters began to chant the name of Nicolas Raskin, the Belgium midfielder left out of the squad amid a dispute with the Rangers manager. The crowd broke into chants against Martin when Lawrence Shankland drove the visitors ahead in the 22nd minute and they sporadically targeted him during the rest of another dismal performance.
Rangers stepped it up in the second half but, after seeing his 82nd-minute penalty saved by Jack Butland, Shankland netted the rebound for Hearts’ first win at Ibrox in 11 years to take them nine points clear of the home side.
Martin was not a popular appointment in the summer and his rating with supporters plummeted further after four successive draws in the league and being bundled out of the Champions League qualifiers by Club Brugge 9-1 on aggregate.
The international break had allowed the former Southampton boss to bolster his squad. The Canada defender Derek Cornelius, on loan from Marseille, and Youssef Chermiti, the 21-year-old Portuguese attacker who signed from Everton for a reported fee of £8m, started on the bench for Rangers, unchanged from a goalless draw against Celtic before the international break, when they failed to have a shot on goal.
