Daylight robbery with no crime attached
Rangers were mugged when they lost to Celtic in the Betfred Cup final earlier this month.
On Sunday they retaliated by carrying out a robbery in broad daylight at Celtic Park. They robbed Celtic, and their supporters, of the notion that Nine in a Row is a foregone conclusion and a precursor to the fabled Ten in a Row.
They burgled Neil Lennon’s side in a place where Rangers had not won a league match for nine years.
And they picked the pockets of a Celtic side who were powerless to resist because Rangers had the greater physical strength and mental fortitude.
But there was no criminality attached to robbing Celtic of their self-esteem in full view of sixty-thousand people, and only the delusional would disagree with any of the above.
This is not to say that anyone associated with Celtic should be fearful of Rangers. Yet.
But they should be honest enough to be mindful of the fact that, for the first time since darkness descended on Ibrox in 2011, Rangers are in a place where they can be reasonably confident of ending Celtic’s long running domestic superiority.
Steven Gerrard has won nothing in a year and a half in charge of Rangers, but he might just be in a position to do so now.
And in the process he could destroy the Celtic supporters’ dream of an historical ten titles in a row, because number nine is certainly in jeopardy.
Celtic are now under pressure to equal, or better, anything Gerrard’s side do in the league between now and next derby meeting of the clubs at Ibrox in March because Rangers have a game in hand at home to a bottom six club up their sleeves as a potential ace in the hole.
There haven’t been many occasions over the last decade when you could say Celtic came up short tactically, physically and temperamentally against Rangers.
But they were deficient in all of those departments at the weekend.
And the game was up, psychologically speaking, when Celtic threw on a clearly unfit Leigh Griffiths in the dying minutes of a game in which they had obviously run out of ideas.
It was a substitution equivalent to a desperate team throwing their goalkeeper up into the opposition’s penalty area for a last minute corner kick in the forlorn hope of grabbing an equalising goal.
There was no strategy other than one, last throw of the dice. Close your eyes, offer a silent prayer and hope that Lady Luck might take a shine to you. She demurred.
There is now a need for a more carefully thought out, financially based, plan to combat what is going on in the league.
Celtic, with more money than all of the other clubs in the Premiership combined, will need to buy their way out of trouble or else lose the title.
The strength in depth within their squad has been called into question. There is depth in terms of sheer numbers, but is there strength?
Rangers, based on the evidence of the last two derby matches, have Celtic’s number and Gerrard will have their title as well at the end of the season unless there is some judicious spending done by the defending champions when the transfer window opens on Wednesday.
Now is the test of Celtic’s ambition and the quality of those responsible for player recruitment.
Rangers are at the door. How secure are the locks at Celtic Park?
The players who have won eight titles in a row and the last nine domestic trophies have unquestionably shown resilience on an unprecedented scale. But have some now been asked to go to the well too often?
And question marks can surely be placed against the names of some who have been brought in to supposedly strengthen the squad.
Rangers’ level of performance is rising at a time when Celtic’s conviction and decision making were exposed as being insufficient against their greatest rivals on Sunday.
And spare me any complaints about the lavish nature of Gerrard’s celebrations at the end of the game. The manager with a Champions League winners’ medal from his playing career looked as if he’d won that trophy over again instead of a league match in Scotland, but so what?
Rangers have waited nine years for the possibility, but not yet the established fact, of becoming title winners.
They’ve watched a scarf being tied round one of their goalposts at Ibrox after a Celtic win and exotic celebrations from visiting players in the wake of lavish wins there.
Getting your own back is an allowable reaction.
Less acceptable were the gestures made by Ryan Kent and Alfredo Morelos, as well as the underling who got carried away on the Rangers bench.
Gesturing a gun being put to the temple and a throat being cut are distasteful and should be discouraged.
The day was too joyful for Rangers to be tarnished by tacky gesturing.
But the bit that mattered, the events on the pitch, have blown open the title race.
Rangers were overwhelming. Celtic were underwhelming in their response to being beaten on their own ground.
It’s what happens next that’s important.