Rangers and their long-suffering punters find themselves in a scenario they could only have dreamed about on the day Steven Gerrard strode into Ibrox back in July.

Top of the league in the middle of December and with a Europa League group campaign behind them, the club has certainly come a long way from the embarrassment of Pedro Caixinha standing in a bush in Luxembourg after his side had been dumped out by a team who had never won a European game in their entire history.

Yet there are murmurings of uncertainty among some fans on social media about Steven Gerrard and the players. I don’t get it. Those same supporters need to remember the mess their club was in 12-18 months ago.

Gerrard is a young manager and is going to make mistakes. Surely a degree of patience has to be applied as well as perspective to the progress the club has made? Rangers have improved immeasurably in Europe within a short space of time and closed the gap considerably on Celtic.

It can’t happen overnight. It’s going to take time and at least another transfer window before Rangers can bring in the kind of quality that can put it up to Celtic domestically.

That starts in January which is shaping up to be a huge transfer window for all concerned with the club. Rangers are not as far away as many might think. But they desperately need one or two key areas upgraded. His signings overall so far have been more miss than hit though and he simply cannot afford another of the same ilk next month.

Steven Davis has been linked to the club and he is precisely the kind of player Rangers should be looking to bring in. Crucially he knows the expectations and demands of the club. That is an area I think that Gerrard’s current group is deficient in. They lack the been-there-done-it winning mentality required on both sides of the Glasgow divide.

Celtic have winners in abundance in their squad. They can handle the huge demands and pressure to win week in, week out. Only Allan McGregor, Andy Halliday and Scott Arfield really get what Rangers are about and have the desire and demands to win every single game. That Rangers shirt requires big shoulders to fill it and simply put they don’t have enough players capable of doing just that.

Yesterday’s narrow 1-0 win against Hamilton and the previous week’s insipid

1-1 draw showed that Rangers also need more firepower at the top end of the pitch. They desperately require another striker as back up to the talented-but-unpredictable Alfredo Morelos; even more crucially they need a No.10 to open up the packed defences that Rangers inevitably face most weeks.

Kyle Lafferty has been a massive disappointment so far in his second spell. The form and goals he produced at Hearts seem a million miles away and Umar Sadiq just wasn’t good enough and will be out the door.

But the key will be signing someone – a Tom Rogic or Ryan Christie type – with the craft and guile to open the door and thread passes between and behind centre backs. Rangers just do not have that player at the moment and it has cost them seven or eight points already in the league, a place in the League Cup final and possibly a place in the last 32 of the Europa League.

That has to be top of Gerrard’s Christmas list and getting that quality player who could be the difference between challenging Celtic for the title or facing a struggle to finish in the top three. The league is that tight. Rangers are top of the Premiership again but can they handle the pressure and demands that their fans and manager will now heap on them?

They failed miserably against Aberdeen the last time they hit the summit. Gerrard has already stated that staying top is the hardest part. With a tough run coming up including Hibs twice and Celtic at home that winning mentality with be put under the utmost pressure.

If Rangers can go into 2019 still top of the table then the Rangers fans and players might start to believe they can halt what looked an inevitable stroll for Celtic towards 10 in a row.

Beating Celtic and Brendan Rodgers for the first time could prove the catalyst for a glorious first season for their rookie manager.

But have they got the quality and more crucially the mentality to do it? Celtic have proved that they can talk the talk and walk

the walk.

Can Rangers do the same? We shall soon see.