As far as optimism goes, Rangers were blown full of positive energy as they made the Saturday-night trip to Dundee on the back of seven straight wins.

However, a Dan Neil error felt “like a balloon popping”, said manager Derek McInnes, resulting in the Ibrox side fluffing their chance to move back to the Scottish Premiership summit after a gripping 2-2 draw at Dens Park.

McInnes’ men were punished for a disjointed first half when the impressive hosts went ahead through Bradley Fink, but Badredine Bouanani fired in a leveller just before the break.

Rangers lifted their intensity and level of dominance after the interval and were heading for an eighth consecutive victory when Nicolas Raskin slammed in a long-range stunner.

But a mishit Neil backpass to goalkeeper Ivor Pandur was pounced on by Callum Jones to earn Dundee a deserved point, opening the door for Celtic to extend their lead at the top to four points when they welcome Hearts on Sunday (15:00 BST).

“We’ve made a mistake for Dundee’s equaliser and it was like a balloon popping,” McInnes told BBC Scotland. “We then had to dig deep and go again, and we never quite managed to get to the same levels.

“It does feel like a missed opportunity, but in fairness to Dundee they were good value in the first half – it shows you why they are where they are in the league.

“But we can’t come away from home and have to score three goals to win a game.”

McInnes was critical of his side’s first half but praised the 25 minutes that came after the break, saying the dominant period “shows what the team are capable of”.

“When we play in that manner, we’re a very good team,” he added.

The problem is 25-minute performances don’t win leagues, said Rangers title winner Derek Ferguson post-match.

“If Rangers want to win games in this league, then they can’t just play for 20 or 25 minutes,” the former midfielder said on BBC Sportsound.

“When you look back at it, they were sensational for that amount of time, but that has to be for 70 minutes or so if they are going to win league titles.”

While McInnes was keen to point out that his team should not be required to score three goals to win matches, he did touch on a theme of wastefulness.

Rangers’ expected goals (xG) rating of almost two reflects the goals they scored at Dens Park, but over the course of the season they are underperforming.

The Ibrox side have scored 13 league goals from a total accumulated xG of just under 20 – an underperformance of almost seven goals.

Having worked so hard to reel Celtic back to within touching distance after a shaky start to the campaign, McInnes cannot afford a pattern of profligacy to plague his team with a challenging run of fixtures on the horizon.

“We had so many better chances than [Raskin’s goal] to take the game away from Dundee,” McInnes said on Sky Sports. “It’s something we need to be far better at.

“It’s the same kind of theme for me a lot of the time. We’ve had dominant performances but not really had the goals to show for it.”