Celtic will have to keep the Champagne on ice for a while longer after failing to collect the three points required to win the league at Ibrox this afternoon. The champions-elect looked nervous early on with few looking comfortable in possession, allowing Rangers significant periods of possession. After only 10 minutes Rangers were ahead when Sone Aluko beat Thomas Rogne before cutting inside Charlie Mulgrew and firing a shot past Forster in the Celtic goal.
Celtic scarcely featured as an attacking threat in the first half but moments after going behind Georgios Samaras produced one of the most scintillating pieces of skill on the day. The Greek international collected the ball 70 yards from goal, beat four opponents before his shot from 12 yards was saved by Alan McGregor. Anthony Stokes mishit the rebound allowing McGregor to tip over.
Stokes forced a further save from McGregor with a fine volley after controlling on his chest but the game was soon to look ominous for Celtic. Cha Du-Ri was caught wrong side of Lee Wallace and made the slighted touch on the Rangers player who went to ground two yards outside the penalty area. Referee Calum Murray sent Cha off despite the covering attendance of Charlie Mulgrew.
Despite their numerical advantage Rangers seemed content to prevent Celtic scoring, Fraster Forster didn’t make a single save while Celtic were numerically on level terms or only a single man down. Ten minutes after the break Victor Wanyama was red carded for a two footed tackle on Steven Whittaker.
Lee McCulloch was fortunate to remain on the field after elbowing Scott Brown on the head. In a carbon copy of the incident which ended Beram Kayal’s season in December, McCulloch went to ground after the incident until attended by a physio, which perhaps tempered the referee’s response. Clever, if predictable.
With things clearly not going their way Celtic then lost an offside goal. Celtic had an opportunity to make an attempt on goal when they won a free kick 28 yards out. With Charlie Mulgrew still running into position Scott Brown played a quick pass to Kris Commons but Celtic players were crowded out by a number of opponents and lost possession. Rangers broke forward and applied pressure which brought the best out of Fraser Forster but Andrew Little put Rangers two ahead from what was clearly an offside position.
A further breakaway on the 77th minute resulted in Lee Wallace putting Rangers three goals ahead.
Despite being two goals down substitute Kris Commons started to dictate play and brought Celtic their best period of possession. In the 89th minute Georgios Samaras broke through the Rangers defence but was scythed to the ground by Bocanegra. The referee awarded a penalty and ordered the Rangers player off. Scott Brown scored the penalty
Moments later Commons got the better of Whittaker on Celtic’s left before being brought down by the Rangers player. Commons found Thomas Rogne with the resultant free kick which the defender powered home.
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In years to come it will say in the history books 3-2 for Rangers it wont say how the result came about just that fat sleekit Ally won the match over Neil Lennon and that for me is very hard to stomach. However,I also believe the history books will show that Celtic won the league and Rangers were Liquidated.H.H.
Had a good laugh reading Paul67’s match report …………….
Walked into ibrox today meet a old school friend with a picture of his old mentor who took him to his first game.Team and manager let the fans down(not the key board fans)poor effort will hurt tonight.
Still waiting for Murray’s apologists from this morning to come on and say that they got it wrong.
A number of posters here several years back predicted this type of performance from Murray. Dirty, stinkin cheat that he is.
What level of the craft has Dallas junior reached?
Gordon64
If we’re going to get out once and for all, it has to be now. Otherwise, same old same old.
But I suppose we need to wait until the whole hun establisment crumbles, which is looking fairly imminent :))
iki
I was amazed at how quickly and how loudly our support started chanting “Off! Off!” before Sammi had even hit the ground. With he huns in silence, Bocanegra knew he was in trouble and started walking away into a crowd of other Gers players. Calum Murray was distracted and seemed to be preparing for the penalty and desperately trying to forget about the perpetrator. Our support’s chanting shamed him into remembering his job.
Pluses for me today were :
Broonie
Sammi
Rogne
Izzy and Commons both looked a bit more like the players of last year
Minuses
Only two of our signings this season were on the pitcoohing two more on the bench, and even worse none of our Xmas signings anywhere near the pitch
Cha is a liability
Hopefully we will win the league next week , and then we need some serious planning for next year. I can’t help but think that if we took the combined wages of Bangura, Rasmussen , Brozak, etc we could have afforded Shane Long
Finally does anyone know if we have any plans to make any last minute signings next year from the Nordic leagues of players who immediately pick up injuries and then disappear …hoiveld, Lustig, Bangura , Rasmussen etc …?
pggtips2 at 18:05
You are wrong. Cha foul was not for red. That one was for yellow.
Not OBVIOUS goalscoring oportunity. There was another Celtic player covering that area. Rangers player was not running straight on the goal.
In association football (soccer), one often hears that the “last defender” to make a tackle should get the red card. That was true once upon a time, but the Laws of the Game have evolved over time. The offence that is in question is, “Denying an obvious goal scoring opportunity.” This is one of seven sending-off offences in Law 12.
The full offence, as stated in the Laws of the Game, is “denying an obvious goal scoring opportunity to an opponent moving towards the player’s goal by an offence punishable by a free kick or a penalty kick.” This long phrase has many important components that must coincide.
The first keyword there is “obvious.” This one word is the distinction between this offence being cautionable or worthy of an expulsion. If a player does not have an obvious goal scoring opportunity, then the opponent is only guilty of breaking up a promising attack. The next key phrase is that the player must be moving towards the goal. In other words, the direction of play is important. This means that if a player is moving away from the goal and the last defender tackles him, the referee is unlikely to consider that an obvious goal scoring opportunity.
The third critical phrase there is that the offence committed must be punishable by a free kick or penalty kick. In other words, the offence must be one of the ten offences that incur a direct free kick. However, Law 12 specifies that if a player denies an obvious goal scoring opportunity by playing in a dangerous manner (indirect free kick), then the referee should send off the offender.
In assessing whether the conditions have been satisfied, the referee should use certain criteria. The primary criteria can be classified as the “Four Ds.” The first D is distance, followed by direction (of play), defenders (location and number), and derriere (whether the offence was committed from behind). In addition to these criteria, the referee should also consider whether the player was in possession of the ball or had the opportunity to gain possession of the ball.
When considering the distance, one must look at how far away from goal the offence was committed. An offence committed outside the “attacking third” is not typically obvious – just promising. Of course, there are situations where this rule is not absolute. With the direction of play, the referee looks at an imaginary field that surrounds the goal to determine whether play was in its direction. The proximity and number of defenders is also a critical factor, since if another defender is around, the offence is likely to be a cautionable one – even if it occurs in the penalty area.
When deciding to send off a player under this offence, the referee has to look at the intersection of criteria and ensure that all of them are satisfied at a minimum.
SFTB
I suppose there is a first time for everything, then.
Joe Filippis Haircut on 25 March, 2012 at 18:25 said:
In years to come it will say in the history books 3-2 for Rangers
Maybe not. It might say 3-0 to Celtic ;)
Sparkleghirl. Heres. Hopeing H.H.
had time to reflect on the game, like most of the comments the one I agree with most is that we did not turn up again I’m afraid, the ref was very poor as mentioned and the first red was never correct in a million years, that said as much as I love Neil, tactically he failed again. players played out of position and Ki with little pace was never a first pick for me, Vic is struggling and needs time out of the first team, remember he is only 20 years of age. As said last week it is a young side and we should have made some changes over 4 weeks ago to rebalance the lack of maturity, Commons should have had a run along with Izzi to aid his recovery. Where is Bangurra by the way?.
If we look ahead to the CL early knockout stages it is obvious we require a quality imposing physical striker, that will cost money but it is essential if we have ambitions to progress to the group stages, the payback will take care of the investment coupled with a massive clear out of fringe players that do not possess the quality to take us forward with the talented youth that we have currently.
Let’s hope for a party next Sunday where we can all enjoy the occasion as the Celtic family should, at our own home.
Hail Hail
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Callum Murray gave Hearts that penalty when a Hearts player handled it.
He is a disgusting wee creep like Collum the week before.
Celtic were not great today but they would have been within their rights to refuse to come out for the second half.
The Murray /Lennon incident is going to be Dougie Dougie 2. Something very funny going on there.
Scotland is a filthy backwater and i have my dancing shoes ready for their grave.
I hope next week both Commons and Izzy start,,,thought they both done well when they came on!!
Hail hail
setting free the bears @ 18:23
Fair comment as usual.
But by my calculations, today we needed to be 64.28571428571429% better. And that figure has varied every time we play them. And even then, I’m not sure it’s the right mathematical calculation.
We need a formula for this if we intend to continue plying our trade in this wee country.
Is it fair to expect Lenny and the rest of the staff to be mathematicians as well as everything else already on their plates ??
Voice of reason
Tainted titles over clean balance sheets. You used to jibe us over that one. Are you still so sure about that? 140 years of dig-ni-tee down the EBT Swaneee?
Your laughter is the rictus of pain
SFTB
perhaps Murray saw it as an opportunity to show that he isn`t biased
i mentioned to my son as the third goal went i and the result seemed certain that Murray would take any opportunity towards the end of the match to cover himself against claims of bias
he must have been sweating after Rogne scored
Bocanegra`s sending off was unquestionable ..
Mick
“….officials decided to send Lennon off……”
magnificent7
you forgot the second post to
bobby peta
s, revenue & customs
ItaliaBhoy
This whole rotten show stinks and I for one ain’t buyin’ the shoddy bill of goods
as purloined by a third party in recompense the fourth estate it’s double spread
Treatment on week days and double up on Sundays….Lies And more Lies.
I’d rather douse myself in kerosene on the Vatican tour, it’s Assemblage of candle
lit carnage the average tourist, his easy interplay the inflamed catacombs their
Somnabulent desire to wreck the Hoose, with resurrectionary fervour.
HH
iki
It’s not the first time but it’s certainly a long time since it happened. I may have a rose tinted memory here but my view is that the jungle used to pressurise refs by howling every time a Celt was fouled. Nowadays, we seem to howl at our player for going down.
While I would clearly have loved to have won today, the defeat matters little in the bigger picture. We will still win the league and they will still be liquidated. And those are two things to look forward to.
It seems they raised a few more pennies today selling their wee flags. Maybe I’ll have to revise my estimate of their fighting fund up a little. It was standing at 0.16% of their total debt. It might mow be as high as 0.2%.
FFM
We need / must free ourselves of this league.
It has held us back for too long.
How can we endure these inept officials
and administrators.
George Peat ?
C’mon we need an exit plan now.
I never thought I would say this but we missed the physical presence and experience of big Dan today.
Timabhoy on 25 March, 2012 at 18:37 said:
magnificent7
you forgot the second post to
bobby peta
s, revenue & customs
i saw both your posts to your fellow hun
liquidation is permanent
We are very lucky on this forum to have a Friend called Zbyszek.
Bunnet Doffed.
TBB
Maybe karma did this to us to save half a dozen Celtic fans lives tonight – who knows.
The referee was questionable and the pendumlum seemed to land in Rangers favour every time he gave a decision.
By the letter of the laws of the game, if the contact on Wallaces shoulder was not enough to make his legs crumble from beneath him its considered simulation. When you add the fact the ball was 8 yards away from him and around 8-10 yards from both Mulgrew and Forster then its amazing how a referee could so categorically come to an instant conclusion.
Consider Anthony Stokes last week.
Wanyamas tackle had less than no intent, no follow through and no studs showing, it was a yellow card.
The 2nd goal was blatantly offside – consider Stokes being put clear through in the 1st half a yard onside.
HOWEVER
Our performance was in my opinion gutless. When the cut comes to the chase we have no balls. We are chronically lacking leaders.
Say all you want about how great it is having this fantastic young team we have, who are going to grow together etc
They stood on the cusp of becoming a folklore Celtic team, they could have won the treble and won the league at Ibrox.
When it came down to it we werent good enough last week or today.
Rogne for a man of his size was bullied again.
Cha – il refrain from linking the big game howlers he tends to have because I dont think it was a sending off
Matthews – rabbit in the headlights and bizarelly preferred as a left back ahead of Izaguirre
Wanyama – no balls. His reaction at giving the ball away before the sending off was shocking. Starting to look like a big game flight risk.
Ki – If it wasnt conclusive before today then it surely has to be now. He doesnt have the stomach for a fight. If you cant perform against the huns then there is no point in you playing for us.
Ledley – AWOL for 2 games now.
Managers.
1 had his team correctly prepared, correctly motivated and hungry enough to win the game. He also adapted his formation when he saw how the opponents were lining up, to his advantage which contributed to his side going 1-0 up and gaining an early foothold on the game.
The other continued with a 451 formation after hearing the opponents were going to line up 541.
He failed to adapt and do what the game was crying out for before the damage was done – 2 up top.
Ill not blame the manager for an apparent lack of fire in the belly, motivation or balls. Its impossible to know whats going on outside the dressing room.
If we want to do anything in the Champions League next season we desperately need a tactician and 2 leaders. 2 experienced pro’s 28-29 and who may cost a few pound.
When fate rather than referee Collum punished Steven Naismith at Aberdeen, it was just another example of the letter of the Law not being followed by the Hugh Dallas gang
“My players showed in the second half why they are going to be the champions.”
Just wish they had in the first half Neil
Nothing changes. Murray pleaded for the ‘rangers three’ at their hearing last season. So no surprises today then. None at all. The one thing that will never change in my heart is my love of my community and Celtic. I am, like all of you the luckiest person alive to have been born a Celtic man. Up’s and down’s? Deal with them. I woke up today a Celtic man, I bid my kid’s good morning today a Celtic man. At 10.30 Mass I was a Celtic man. Always will be until my dying breath a Celtic man. I’m a lucky man. Ain’t we all. HH.
Just watched the match again. At the end Swally (stage managed by sky )stood at end of the tunnel to shake hands with the defeated Celtic players. Tanner says ” a nice touch “.So the gloating hun thinks that is fine.
Imagine if Celtic had won the title and Neil Lennon stood at the tunnel asking the huns to shake his hand.
Cue mayhem and disgust from the hun media. Gloating wee ginga tim, could have caused a riot etc. etc .
Thats why I am paranoid
Hail Hail.
Does the Neil Lennon getting sent to watch the TV set a precedent?
Officials have a chat over tea and a biscuit at half time and arising from it they decide that a player has misbehaved during first half. Player is then told that he has been red carded just as he leaves dressing room for second half.
SFTB
Just one Q. When do you think we will stop paying the price for Dougie Dougie?
I’ll give you my opinion before you answer.
That’ll be when some form of Euro league structure is formed allowing us to play within the actual rules of work football rather than the imaginated ones of association football.
MWD.
I see have a couple of additional visitors with us this evening. It says everything about them that they are here rather than celebrating their hollow victory with their own kind.
Still, I guess you can still be anti Celtic when there is no one left to be pro.
Gollum must be pigsick. He has spent the whole week believing he had nailed the scottish cup final as well.
Well done Stevie from Lanarkshire on there on the 606 phone on 5 live….Moonbeams and voodoo economics…..Scottish football corrupt, clear and concisely to the point…giving it large on national radio. Host did not know what to say or interrupt. Cap doffed Steviebhoy….
harryhoodsdugbitme on 25 March, 2012 at 18:40
Great comment.
We were rotten again today. Yet again we change formation to play the Huns.
They were more up for it physically and mentally. We looked scared from the start.
The referee also looked scared to book a Hun.