22 mins: Rangers will be mad at themselves – it was too easy. And the guests had probably overcome the first quarter. Collective Exclusion and Celtic more than good enough to take advantage. Parkhead is rocking.
GOAL! Celtic 1-0 Rangers (Iota 21)
Out of nowhere Celtic leads! Maeda floats inside to the left to find … yards of space. He interferes in the penalty area, past Goldson and shoots the ball across. Giotta stormed in from the right and passed through Barisic to strike with a volley.
19 min: Furuhashi puts Basie under pressure, while Celtic seem to push his wrong start …
18 min .: Everything has calmed down a bit, this early furious pace gives way to a little calm football for control on both sides.
15 mins: Kent thunders on goal from distance but is right in Hart.
13 min: Just wide! Lundstram and Davis are bosses in the middle of the field at the moment – the former wins the ball, the latter finds Arfield on the right. Kent cuts to the left to meet his cross and falls in front of Ralston, but his volley is cut off a yard. Great chance.
12 mins: … killed by O’Reilly, but Lundstram stands up.
11 mins: First correct attack for Celtic. Giotta tries to send the ball on the right, but a deviation leads to a corner …
9 min: Kyogo Furuhashi cuts Lundstram while Rangers tries to throw the ball to the right. The referee keeps his cards in his pocket. For now.
7 mins: Maeda seems to explode ahead after Sakala’s loose pass, but he is also pushed out. Everything is a little shapeless right now.
6 min: Lundstrum attack forward from the right, but Aribo can’t pass Carter-Vickers in the middle to reach the end of the cross.
5 min: Celtic arranged a touch, but Rangers pressed quite effectively the central defenders and refused time for the home team’s ball.
4 min: “Oh, no, not you again, illiterate fun,” smiles Nori Hernon. “Sorry if I’m the only one / 837 to make this joke.” My therapist will be making money this week.
3 mins: Aribo started in the middle for the Rangers, with Sakala on the right and Kent on the left. The latter escaped, but was hindered by Barisic, whose forwarding was poorly judged. However, the guests were the better side in these early fights.
2 min: A frantic, gloomy start, as you might expect.
Take a peek! The Rangers start with the bright sun in Glasgow.
Players go out to the Parkhead cauldron. John Terry is in the stands with a Celtic scarf, and Rod Stewart is also there. Do the Rangers have reason to believe, or is tonight a Celtic party night?
E-mail before the match: “Quick question for you”, Phil Whitall begins. “I’ve always wondered about the contents of the inbox during heavily loaded matches like this. I guess there is a lot of aggression, pettiness and outright abuse. How are you and your fellow MBM reporters dealing with this? “
Angry Types seems to be sticking to social media these days, instead of focusing on the MBM inbox. It wasn’t always like that: during the Ashes series in Australia many, many years ago, when I was OBO from London, I went in at 2 am or whatever and every day without interruption the same person sent me an email with variations of ” Oh, not you again, illiterate drummer. Apparently I managed to do that by burying my feelings deep inside and only occasionally allowing them to torment me a decade later.
Again these teams, this time in text form:
Celtic (4-3-3 probable): Hart; Ralston, Carter-Vickers, Starfelt, Taylor; O’Reilly, McGregor, Hatet; Giotto, Furuhashi, Maeda. Substitutes: Beaton, Giacakakis, Abada, Turnbull, McCarthy, Rogick, Bain, Forest, Welsh.
Rangers (4-3-1-2 probable): McGregor; Tavernier, Goldson, Bassi, Barisic; Lundstram, Davis, Arfield; Aribo; Sakala, Kent. Replace: Jack, Diallo, Eaton, Camara, Sands, Wright, McLaughlin, Lowry, King.
Referee: John Beaton
A little reading before the match: here’s Ewan Murray for today’s match and the bigger picture in the Premiership.
The teams
Preamble
Hello and welcome to the minute-by-minute coverage of the fifth and final game of the Old Firm for the 2021-22 season and the third meeting between these countries in less than a month. Rangers beat their neighbors in the cup last time, but Celtic drew the Ibrox League in early April and could effectively seal the Scottish Premiership title with a victory today.
Celtic lead the Rangers by six points in the remaining four games, so while a Rangers victory today would delay the coronation, Glasgow’s blue half will still need Celtic to lose points in two of their last three games if they want to give up. rivals his 10th title in 11 years.
The start is at 12:00 BST.
Add Comment