Djorkaeff (14): Questioned Rangers' desire for the fight (Photograph/Allsport)

A 3-0 defeat in the Fritz Walter Stadion ensured the Ibrox side beat another gloomy retreat from Germany with their season stripped of European action and condemned to nothing more than championship catch-up on Celtic.

And Advocaat even backed Djorkaeff's assessment when he said his players had both failed to take their chances or match the work-ethic practised by Andreas Brehme's team.

'Rangers must show the same face at home or abroad - it should not matter where you are playing,' said French international Djorkaeff, after yet another big game failure by the Scottish champions.

'They did not have any fight and I was surprised by that. We wanted to have a happy Christmas knowing that we have UEFA Cup football to look forward to in February.

'That was our motivation and it should have been the same for Rangers. We played harder and ran harder - and finally we were rewarded.'

Second-half goals from Andreas Buck and Vratislav Lokvenc confirmed a UEFA Cup last-16 place for Brehme and his team after Miroslav Klose had wiped out the 1-0 scoreline from Ibrox within the first eight minutes.

The Germans also made dark mutterings about taking inspiration from an incident in the Fritz Walter Stadion corridors on Tuesday when, allegedly, anti-German comments were expressed when Rangers and Kaiserslautern both arrived to train.

'There was some aggression in the tunnel and that was more motivation for my players,' said Brehme afterwards, although the grudge match never materialised on the field.

Advocaat, who cast doubt on the tunnel allegations made in German newspapers, was crestfallen after all the investment designed to clinch post-Christmas European involvement for the first time in eight years.

But his post-match comments were strikingly similar to last season in Dortmund. 'Now we have to focus on the league but I know where we went wrong,' he said.

'We couldn't handle their work-rate and Kaiserlautern deserved their victory.

'You only get a few chances at this level of football and we had five or six good ones today but couldn't take them. The second and third goals we conceded were also down to individual errors.'

He defended leaving out Ronald de Boer and Michael Mols from his starting line-up, insisting both had been unable to prove their fitness after knee injuries.

'We needed to defend from the front but immediately we found ourselves one-on-one in defence,' he said.