The home side dominated possession for large spells but only rarely looked like troubling Neil Alexander in the visitors’ goal.
Walter Smith had introduced Alexander, celebrating his 33rd birthday, to get the goalkeeper some first team action ahead of the League Cup final later this month in which he will also feature.
His inclusion was one of three changes made by the Rangers boss with Kyle Lafferty recovering sufficiently from tonsillitis to feature, along with teenage midfielder Kyle Hutton.
The trio replaced Allan McGregor, David Healy and John Fleck with those three joining Vladimir Weiss, Gregg Wylde, Kane Hemmings and Darren Cole on a relatively inexperienced bench.
It was a difficult first 45 minutes for the visitors with the early stages seeing El Hadji Diouf isolated up front and the Rangers rear guard the busiest area of the pitch.
Despite their early dominance of possession the home side didn’t carve a real opening until a moment of class from Ola Toivonen opened the door after 16 minutes.
He cushioned a pass on the edge of the Gers area in to the path of Marcus Berg, but the striker was beaten to the ball by an alert Alexander.
While Toivonen and Berg were trying to find a way through in the middle it was the wide areas that saw PSV cause Rangers more problems.
On the left Balazs Dzsudzsak was the threat, though he blazed over after 22 minutes when he was better placed to pick a pass.
And on the right it was right back Stanislav Manolev that was causing the problems for Steven Whittaker. He and Jeremain Lens were a constant menace to Whittaker and Lafferty on the flank.
Lens blasted another effort high and wide with 10 minutes of the half remaining after skipping past the challenges of Whittaker and Hutton.
But PSV’s best opportunity came two minutes later when Marcelo and Berg got in each other’s way at the back post.
Dzsudzsak’s free kick from the Dutch side’s left flank took a touch off Lens and looked to have presented Marcelo with the perfect opportunity.
But he headed over from just a few yards out with Berg just behind him also unmarked and waiting for the easiest of finishes.
It was a real let off for the visitors, whose best chances also came from set pieces with a Whittaker free kick and a series of corners on the half hour allowing a few Light Blue shirts to make their way forward.
Little came of the deliveries though and Smith’s side would have been happy simply to make it to half time on level terms.
The teams emerged at the start of the second half to the sound of Simply The Best blaring through the Philips Stadium PA system.
Initially the noise of the anthem usually belted out at Ibrox seemed to rouse Smith’s side with a fine run from Richard Foster five minutes in to the second period a signal of intent.
He burst across field and down the left flank before trying to pick out Diouf in the box, forcing a corner from Orlando Engelaar.
Diouf took the resulting set piece and his delivery was just behind an advancing Kyle Bartley. But just as it looked like Rangers were improving they almost conceded.
Again it was Toivonen with the inventive play, slotting a ball behind David Weir that set Berg free once again, but the big striker pulled his shot wide of Alexander’s upright.
Moments later the home support were screaming for a penalty when Manolev broke in to the box only to be denied by Bartley’s strength.
The game was certainly more open and more even in the second period and when Whittaker again did well to get down the left his cross was almost perfect for Diouf.
With the Senegalese forward lurking Wilfred Bouma did well to head behind from a corner.
The set piece would produce the Light Blues’ best chance of the evening with Diouf delivering and Bartley meeting the ball with his head only to see Andreas Isaksson claw it round his post for another corner.
Bartley was in the thick of things at both ends with his pace digging Rangers out of a hole just after the hour mark.
Again Toivonen sent a searching pass in the direction of Berg, but Bartley showed great speed to snuff out the chance with Alexander gathering just in front of the big defender.
With neither side able to make the breakthrough a series of substitutions began with Weiss replacing Diouf for the visitors and Berg being withdrawn in favour of Danny Koevermans.
Within a minute of the home side’s switch they again blew a brilliant chance to take the lead with Marcelo the culprit once more.
This time the defender was advanced on the left and was again completely unmarked, but, as he had in the first half, he produced a poor header to let Rangers off the hook.
It was a glaring miss and one that PSV may live to regret having dominated the first leg but failed to make that possession count.