Amidst all the gibbering praise showering down on Ibrox in midweek, I was aware of two things.
First, how poor Hibs were in a second half where they seemed content to sit on their lead and not venture out of their own half. That was lamentable stupidity and they got exactly what they deserved for attempting it.
You saw it coming a mile off.
Secondly, when they were trying to play football – in the first half – they opened up the Ibrox defence almost at will. They scored twice, forced McGregor into a number of good saves and generally looked good enough to take at least a point.
This is what made the second half performance utterly inexplicable.
Still, the quality of their football in the first half served both as a warning to Celtic for what we can expect at Easter Road eleven days from now and also a good indicator of how we should approach the game when we roll into Ibrox on 2 January.
We have no reason to fear that fixture.
On the evidence of what we witnessed on Thursday night we have the players and the firepower to pull that defence of theirs to pieces, even if they have some key personnel back. The organisation of it was frankly shambolic.
If Hibs can open them up like that we’ll destroy them.
Their strategy might well be to sit back and try and contain us; good luck with that.
In front of their own fans, in a must-win fixture, that would go down like a lead weight. They cannot afford to, in no small part because we would almost certainly find a way to win anyway.
But if they come out and try to play football … well, to be frank, I expect that we’d flay them alive.
We’re a better team in every department and especially so when teams here are daft enough to have a go at us. I didn’t see a single reason to fear them … but every reason to be optimistic that the firepower at our disposal will be more than they can bear.
Hibs took the foot off their throat in midweek, allowing The Mooch to paint himself as some kind of tactical genius who turned around a one goal deficit to win the game. It is, of course, arrant nonsense because all Hibs had to do was keep on playing as they had in the first 45 minutes and they’d have been good for at least a point.
We will show no such mercy. We will press down hard.
That midweek performance should have filled their fans with dread.
That it has sparked euphoria is all the confirmation we needed that these Peepul aren’t playing with a full deck.
Rangers are better than all the shit we’ve played. I’m worried about the lack of performance so far with us.
All Hibs needed to do James, was to score that penalty to go 1-3 ahead, oh! sorry didn’t get a penalty, my mistake, anyway teams watching that game will surely realise that was a game lost by Hibs and in turn know to press them. However, I doubt that’ll happen. Apart from the fact the Dandy Don’s will sit in and give away penalties when the ball touches the hair on their arms, and most other teams will do likewise. We can wipe the floor with them for sure if we outwit the MIBs.
When teams are ‘daft’ enough to have a go at us? You did a full article slagging Aberdeen for not having a go at us.
Personally wouldnae make predictions like ‘we’ll destroy them’ myself, tho ahm confident we can get a result and one thing ahm sure of, is that while Hibs chucked it after 50 mins and that suited the ibrox team, they’ll find us a different animal because we won’t.
Unfortunately, it’s not Sevco that I fear, it’s the officials and their ” interpretation ” of the rules via VAR .
I’m confident we will run their defence ragged and show them up. I’m less confident we will score the goals. Our finishing is wasteful and unfortunately that could be our undoing against them. I think we will win, but don’t share your certainty.
I think you should beware of being over-confident. Yes their backline is poor but ours is not that great either in reality and they have players who can hurt us. Playing at Ibrox is never easy (except when BR was our manager and Pedro was theirs!). Will we be the bookies favourites – most likely. Do I think we will win – probably. Would I bite your hand off for a draw right now – absolutely!
The Rangers defence is suspect , the Rangers squad is suspect ,the Rangers mentality is suspect and most importantly ,the Rangers manager is highly suspect ! I’m not being overconfident ,I’m giving the true facts ….All the pressure is on the Bealy boy and it will be suffocating.. Big Ange can smoke one of his now famous ceegars on the touchline if he wants ….