Smith's last season as Rangers manager got off to a winning start

Rangers manager Walter Smith says the Ibrox club will be trying hard to sign more players before the closure of the transfer window.

Smith gave a debut to James Beattie in the opening day Scottish Premier League win over Kilmarnock, the striker being Rangers' only summer capture so far.

"You can see today that we do need additions to our squad," Smith told BBC Scotland after the 2-1 win.

"Hopefully, we'll try and get them over the next two weeks."

A proposed move for Rapid Vienna's Croatian striker, Nikica Jelavic, has hit stumbling blocks, but Smith's assistant Ally McCoist earlier told Radio Scotland's Sportsound programme that the deal was not completely dead.

"It's certainly on the back burner at the moment because there are one or two things that can't be finalised and there's one or two problems there," said McCoist.

"It's certainly on the back burner at the moment, I wouldn't say it's dead.

I think James Beattie showed that he will be a valuable addition to our group Rangers manager Walter Smith

"We've made enquiries for players, we're certainly interested in players, we need to bring players in, we want to bring players in and we will bring players.

"We need to give our lads a hand, that goes without saying. We need to give the supporters a little bit of a boost as well. We're certainly doing everything we can to bring new additions to our squad."

Goals from Kenny Miller and Steven Naismith gave Rangers victory over Killie, who registered their goal with a penalty by Jamie Hamill.

And Smith was pleased with the contribution of 32-year-old Beattie, who only started after illness prevented Steven Davis from featuring.

"Overall, you're always delighted to get the first game of the season under your belt and it was one of those games where I felt we could've gone on to get some more goals but didn't do so and, in the end, we're delighted to win," Smith said.

"He has only played two halves for the reserves.

"When you consider that most of our boys have had half-a-dozen games now, he's well behind the rest.

"So hopefully, with training and the extra games over the next few weeks, it'll bring him up to speed, but I think he showed that he will be a valuable addition to our group."

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