JAMES TAVERNIER wants Rangers to be challenging for every competition they enter this year as they try to deliver the silverware to Ibrox that the club’s supporters so desperately crave.

The new Rangers captain knows that expectations of a title challenge will be high among fans who have been enthused by the arrival of Steven Gerrard as manager, and while he stopped short of proclaiming his side capable of wresting the trophy away from Celtic, he iterated his desire to put up a fight for all three domestic honours.

“We want to be competing for everything,” Tavernier said. “We want to be there all the way in the league and everyone wants to win the cups. That’s our aim.

Read more: James Tavernier says Rangers are in it to win it as he aims to challenge on all fronts

“We have not specifically set any targets. But we’ve obviously got the Europa League and we want to do well on Thursday night and get into the next round. Then we want a good start to the league season on Sunday.

“It’s a long season. Our aim is to be in the challenge for the title and we want to be in the challenge for the title this season.

“The fans have wanted that ever since the first season we came into the Premiership - and I don’t blame them. They’ve not had the title for a while and one of the reasons I wanted to come up here was to win trophies.

“The boys know the expectations of the club and the expectations of the fans. We obviously want to meet the requirements.”

Tavernier believes it is impossible at this stage to judge if Rangers have managed to close what often appeared a cavernous gap between themselves and the Celtic side who won the Premiership last season.

“We’ve not played each other yet this season, so we will have to wait and see,” he said. “There’s a lot of new faces in our squad and we are still gelling and working hard for each other.

Read more: Lee McCulloch: Steven Gerrard must challenge Celtic and lift silverware in his first season at Rangers

“We have already made a good start in the Europa League. We want to win on Sunday [against Aberdeen]. We know we will get judged on every game we play.”

What is driving Tavernier’s confidence in his side’s ability to make a better fist of a title challenge this season is the solidity that his new manager has managed to instill in the previously soft heart of the Rangers defence.

“It’s four new faces if you include Allan McGregor in goals,” he said. “Connor [Goldson] and I have a really good relationship and it’s getting stronger and stronger.

“On the left side, Flanno [Jon Flanagan] and Niko [Katic] have a great relationship. That’s been shown in us keeping five clean sheets. The lads in front of us are helping us out too. We have resilience, especially in the Europa League match, and I feel we are only going to go from strength to strength.”