By Stewart Fisher

STEVEN Gerrard has asked his players to be relentless in pursuit of glory after watching them cut their arrears on Celtic at the top of the Ladbrokes Premiership to a solitary goal. Taking to the field after Celtic had recorded a 4-1 win in Dingwall, Gerrard’s side racked up five goals without reply against a rudderless Hearts side to trail by the smallest margin imaginable ahead of the midweek fixture card. Goal difference could decide the tightest title challenge for years but Gerrard insists he is grumpy man if he doesn’t win every match by the biggest margin possible.

“We want to win by the biggest margin we can and probably in the eyes of the players I’m a bit of a moaner like that, he said. “Some of them maybe want to come off the gas and relax at three and four but not for me - I want to continue to keep doing the right things.

“As a team we’re not at a level where we can just pick and choose when we stay on the gas so for me it needs to be consistent across the board - forget the scoreline and play with the correct intensity and try and score as many as we can,” he added. “But I can’t complain with a 5-0 win on the back of a European night we had to give a lot in. I’d have some cheek to go in and complain about the amount of goals.”

Facing Aberdeen on Wednesday night at Pittodrie and the BetFred Cup final against Celtic at Hampden on Sunday, Gerrard had the luxury of taking Alfredo Morelos off not long after the hour mark and resting Ryan Jack entirely. “If the game was in a comfortable position, I wanted to try and offload some others as well. It was nice to have that luxury.

“Credit to the players, it’s another box ticked and now we recover and go up to Aberdeen. We need to forget about the cup final until the final whistle at Aberdeen.”