Lawrence Shankland understands the frustration and fire of the Rangers fans, but he is adamant he's not asking for patience or taking a worried look at the table as he defended some of his under-fire colleagues.
The newly-appointed Ibrox skipper could feel the fire in the stadium as Hibs' late show left Derek McInnes' team on the floor. It's now three games without a win and Rangers are already five points behind the Premiership pacesetters after just two league dates.
Fan anger and a late sucker punch
Home punters were angry at the result with some also irked at a perceived lack of desire. In the post-match press conference, supporter representatives pointed fingers at a failure to chase back at Hibs' injury-time winner.
The summer sun has yet to fade yet it's clear already that things are in danger of boiling over at Ibrox. Shankland, like his boss, was quick to make clear the fans are well entitled to their views having shelled out through the nose to watch a team that hasn't exactly provided value for money in recent seasons.
As far as the skipper concerned, the angst in the stands is perfectly understandable given what the fans have been through in recent years. He said: "I understand the frustration. I've been around the club long enough in Scottish football as well. I understand the frustration. It's been a build-up for many, many years.
"It's hard to get away from that situation because at the start of every season, everybody's optimistic that they're going to win straight away. I do understand that. But we're not asking for patience.
Defending teammates and a lesson learned
"When we scored, the stadium was bouncing. Everybody was behind us. Of course there's frustration when they're eager for you to get that goal, but when you do give the positive moments, the crowd get behind you.
"It's just a sucker punch we've got at the end. As I said, we committed fully to try and win the game, which we feel as a team is the right thing to do.
"But there's a lesson to be learned there. You don't leave yourself open at the back and get countered so early on.
"100 per cent. I understand it. I've been a fan, I've been in stands before, and I understand people wanting you to score every single time you've got the ball. But we understand that it's not possible.
"We need to try and work at it, especially when you come up against a low block. I know people will say this is the same old story, but it's the truth.
"There's a low block, Hibs defended their box well. We need to try and penetrate them in different ways. If that includes working the balls wide to come into the middle, then we need to do that.
"There were enough moments the other day that I feel we were doing the right thing to try and win the game. Even in the first half, when one goes through the guy's legs, gets cleared off the line behind him.
"In the second half, because under the goalie, he comes off the bar. All these things are quite unusual. It's maybe just a wee bit of luck at the minute. You need to change the way you play. I take encouragement for what I've seen in terms of the amount of chances we create around the box. In weeks to come, we can take those chances and the results will be better."
Responding to criticism
But facing an accusation that some of his team-mates hadn't shown the necessary desire to get back and put a stop to several Hibs attacks ahead of Callum Wright's last-minute winner, Shankland did look to defend his colleagues.
He said: "It's hard for me to respond when I don't really know what incident they're talking about.
"I don't agree that we weren't doing the right thing to try and win the game. We committed a lot of men forward. If you're telling me people are jogging back, I've not seen it.
"From what I've seen, we've had enough numbers behind the ball to try and deal with the situation. I think we may have had three defenders there. The boy gets a lucky deflection and it rolls in the bottom corner in slow motion. I'll need to see the incident back, but for now, I can't really comment too much on it.
"I felt, especially in the second half, there was only really one team that were willing to score and try and get a goal.
"Obviously, we were chasing the equaliser, we managed to get that eventually, and then even from there I felt we were the team that were pushing to try and get the winner.
"As a team, we made the choice to try and commit to get the win and we got punished for it, obviously. The late counter-attack caught us out, and it's just a frustrating one, especially when you feel like you should have definitely at least had a draw at the game.
"It's two defeats and a draw in three games and Shankland said: "I think the biggest thing that went wrong [against Hibs] is we never won.
"I think everything else, performance-wise, the amount of chances we created, the amount we cleared off the line, hit the bar, there was enough moments there for us to take encouragement in terms of we're trying to do the right thing to win the game.
"The biggest thing, obviously, are the judged on here are results, I totally understand that. But if you look to the goals at the game, and you looked at what happened in the game, the amount of moments we had, as I said, I think there was only one team that looked like they were actually going to win it.
So that's the frustrating part. But for their side, it's a smash and grab, and they'll be happy with that."
No panic over points
Rangers have lost vital early ground in the table, but Shankland gave a response to pressure building. He stated: "No, in terms of points, necessarily. There's over 100 to play for, I think, still remaining in the league, so it's not really a time to look at points. But of course you're always under pressure to win games, and we want to get that first win on the board.
"Obviously it's been hard-coming in the first initial three games, but we've got another opportunity on Thursday to try and get that, and as I said before, I feel today we did deserve more than what we got."
