The race for the Scottish Premiership took a different turn yesterday after Celtic grabbed a vital league point from Rangers at Ibrox.
In truth, it should have been more but the Ibrox club were thrown a lifeline after the award of a penalty when Fabio Silva fell to the ground in the Celtic penalty.
At that point, Celtic were 2-0 up and cruising. Yes, Rangers had their tails up as no doubt Philippe Clement had given them a rocket after their poor first-half showing.
But that didn’t stop Graeme Souness from looking at the result with his blue-tinted spectacles on.
Souness was claiming that Rangers would have been the happier team at the end of the game and that Celtic would have been disappointed not to have won it and that the momentum was still with his old club for the title.
Indeed, the 3-3 draw could be regarded as a disappointment but considering we were heading into the game minus Callum McGregor and as underdogs, I’m pretty sure that if you offered that result to the Celtic fans prior to kick-off, they would have taken it.
The Celtic reality that Souness has missed
Souness’ view wasn’t shared by Simon Jordan who let his colleague know that despite his feelings about Rangers’ hopes of winning the title, there is a reality about his old club’s inability to beat Celtic in a meaningful game that he must recognise.
Jordan said [talkSPORT], “It’s interesting Graeme’s take away from his impartial and unbiased vantage point because of the way the game has unfolded.
“That was a decent result for Rangers when they haven’t laid a glove on Celtic this season. Celtic have beaten them twice and drawn.
“If Rangers had won this game they would have probably won the league because they would have been then two points away from Celtic with a game in hand.
“It’s interesting the characterisation. You’re taking the microcosm of the game and saying, yeah, I get it because Rangers got out of jail and had the fortitude to come back even though Celtic had scored early and late.
“But before the game you’ve been beaten twice by them this season and you’ve gone an opportunity to put clear daylight between you.
“That is going to be disappointing for Rangers.
“But Graeme, they haven’t laid a glove on Celtic this season. And I am looking at Rangers and it’s about winning the league.
“They’ve got to beat Celtic and they don’t.”
Rangers fail under pressure from Celtic
And that is the reality for the former Rangers boss. Whenever the pressure is on his old club to deliver a result in a meaningful game, they fail.
Celtic, over the past three seasons, have gone into big derby games like yesterday, like the Scottish Cup semi-final last season and the League Cup Final as well and have dug out a performance to win it.
Even in the first Ibrox derby this season when we were at our weakest, Celtic still managed to go there and grab a vital 1-0 win.
And with the last Glasgow Derby being at Celtic Park and almost all of our big players now returned from injury, it is very difficult to see how Rangers will get a result considering they have failed at every opportunity so far.
However, Brendan Rodgers will take nothing for granted. Before that final derby, he will need to make sure his team win every game leading up to that starting this weekend against St Mirren.
If Rodgers can do that and then beat Rangers at Celtic Park, the title will remain in the Parkhead trophy cabinet for another season.