EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND - MAY 03: Celtic Manager Martin O'Neill raises his fist to the Celtic fans at full time during a William Hill Premiership match between Hibernian and Celtic at Easter Road, on May 03, 2026, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Craig Foy/SNS Group via Getty Images)
There is a strange belief taking root in Scottish football this week, and it is one of the oddest ideas I have heard in a long time. The idea is that Celtic should be deathly afraid of the weekend because the club from Ibrox is going to go all out to stop us winning the league.
They are going to strain every sinew. They are going to push every player to the maximum. They are going to kick, bite, scratch and claw to make sure Celtic are not champions.
On the surface, that might sound reasonable. It isn’t.
When you break it down, it is one of the dumbest theories floating around right now. It is spook-story, scare-house bullshit. It might work on a ten-year-old, but it will not frighten those of us capable of taking the argument apart.
Because even a surface-level understanding of it collapses on contact with reality.
What we are being told is that stopping Celtic will be a major driver and motivator for them. That this will push them to be at their very best.
But how seriously are we supposed to take that?
They will be pushed to be at their very best to prevent a Celtic title, but they could not push themselves to be at their very best to win the title themselves?
I find that logic absurd.
If I were an Ibrox fan, contemplating that state of affairs, I would be offended by it. I would be asking whether the people in my dressing room are more interested in beating their rivals than hoisting silverware for their own club and their own supporters.
I would be pretty angry about that.
I know there are Ibrox fans rubbing their hands together in anticipation of this, but instead of doing that, they should be asking hard questions about their own club. They should be asking what actually drives the people in their dressing room. They should also be asking hard questions of their manager.
Why would he be able to tactically outfox a rival manager in a game that no longer matters for his own title hopes, when he seemed so scandalously unprepared in the two games that actually did?
The media will say they are still playing for second place, and that second place is still worth something to them.
Well, big deal. Second place is not first place. If they are trying to tell us that the motivation to finish second is greater than the motivation to finish first, I call bullshit on that.
Obviously, I do. We all should.
Is stopping Celtic a motivation for them?
Yes, of course it is. Just as stopping them would be a motivation for us in the same circumstances. But if I thought there were people in our dressing room prioritising one derby game over the games that could actually win us the title, I would be concerned.
For Celtic, the importance of this game is simple. It is next.
The opposition does not matter. If the fixtures had been ordered differently, the most important game would still be the next one. That is how it works when you are in a title race where you cannot afford a single slip.
The game in front of you is the one that matters.
That is obvious when you think about it for five minutes.
Yet already I have heard journalists make this weird suggestion that the Ibrox club will be more motivated to win at the weekend because they can stop Celtic winning the title. More motivated, presumably, than they were in the previous two games, which would have kept alive their own chance of winning the title.
How are we meant to take that seriously? If that really is the thinking at Ibrox, then that is bizarre. That is wrong. And that is why they find themselves out of it already.
This is supposed to scare us. It is supposed to make us worried about the fixture. We are supposed to tremble because their manager has described the run-in as three cup finals. But at the start of this run, he was describing it as five cup finals.
As Paulina beautifully illustrated in her piece, he wouldn’t know, since he has never managed in one. His players wouldn’t know either, since almost none of them have played in one. Those who have usually end up on the wrong side of the result.
So, comparing these games to cup finals, when your club has won three trophies in thirteen years, is probably not the comparison I would have made.
If these were five one-off games where winning each one brought its own prize, then the cup-final analogy might stand up. But that is not what this is.
They were knocked out of the title race when they lost to Motherwell.
That result put them four behind Hearts and three behind Celtic. From that moment, it was no longer in their hands. Even if they had won their final four fixtures, they were still out of luck if Hearts did the same.
So, the first one really was a cup final.
And they didn’t win it.
Now Röhl is trying to motivate his team after the real opportunity has already passed them. The media is trying to find motivation for them as well, and all of it is hilarious.
They can spare us any attempt to frighten us with this idea. Even when you break it down to pride and bragging rights, it still doesn’t hold up.
Bragging rights?
In case nobody ever told them, bragging rights do not go into the history books. “We stopped you from winning something” is a pathetic last straw to clutch when your own season has ended without silverware. If you take consolation from that, then you are already admitting how low your standards have fallen.
Let me say what I have said several times before when this bragging-rights question has been put to us. They are worthless. They have absolutely no value at all.
In the context of the season, they have just had, where once again they have made a lot of noise and finished with nothing, the idea that they can claim some mythical victory by delaying Celtic is laughable.
We have knocked them out of two cup competitions. We are on the brink of winning one of them. We are still in the title race. They are not. That is the reality.
Whatever way this is dressed up, it is all hot air.
We are playing a demoralised, weakened, psychologically crushed team with nothing meaningful left to play for. Whatever motivation they invent, whatever slogan they come up with, it will not equal what has motivated us from the start of this run.
Win the games and win the title.
That is the difference.
If they suddenly find something that lets them raise their game beyond what they were able to do when their own title hopes were on the line, then that does not make them dangerous. It makes them losers.
Because if they can only do it when there is no real pressure on them, when there is nothing at stake in terms of their own success, then that club is exactly where it deserves to be.
If Celtic show up for business, Celtic will win.
I am not in the least bit concerned about what they might try to do. If we approach the game in the right way, in the right frame of mind, I expect the three points.
Nothing less will do.
We are not going to kid ourselves about two more cup finals after this weekend. If we lose this weekend, it is over. There is comfort in that, strange as it sounds. There is strength to draw from it, because we know exactly what is required.
We know the stakes. We know the job.
When the chips are down, this team has shown that it can rise and meet adversity head on. We are not the mental weaklings our friends across the city think we are. In fact, right now, we are everything they would dearly love to be.
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Its probably true that both sides are as bad as each other this season. The numbers bear that out. Ths difference is we know we can play better. We have better players, mostly. Some of them have underperformed. Thats where it ends. They are as good as they can be. The club and the fans may be more motivated to beat us, its always their cup final, but their players wont be. Our players, and manager is different. McGregor, Tierney, Johnston,Maeda, Scales even Ihenacheo and Chamberlain are all winners. Their motivation is to pull back the league leaders. That is our motivation. The club, the fans AND the players. That is the difference. We will all pull together. And win or lose thats how it will happen. Its not hype.
Aye, the Scottish media and most Scottish referees are in the their “Stop Celtic” mode. Suddenly everyone in Scotland except Celtic and Hibs supporters, support Hearts.
If I was a Sevco supporter, : which is a nightmare to imagine, It would be with with mixed feelings I would greet a victory. To beat us, in what for them is a game that doesn’t mean much after their last two performances, would just sum them up. In the games that really matter they just don’t turn up. I’m pretty sure if we score the 1st goal, The Sevco players will start thinking of their holidays and one or two of them, the World Cup. Surely with what’s at stake our motivation has got to be spot on compared to their’s.
This Hearts team deserve a lot of credit,
but quite honestly I don’t think they’re all that good, in the last six games, they’ve won three by the odd goal and one by two goals, whilst drawing with Livingston and getting defeated by Kilmarnock. The one thing they’ve had over us and the Ibrox mob is having two natural strikers in Shankland and Braga.
Playing most games without a natural striker has hampered us big time. To think a couple of seasons ago Shankland was available on a Bosman, we or the his favourite team from Ibrox could have picked him up for a signing on fee. The Huns like us have a section of fans who favour foreign players, and turn up their noses at Scottish players, and in our case Scottish and Irish players.
Both Glasgow clubs are now loaded with hopeless foreigners,My belief is that unless the foreign player is better than the UK or Irish based player why sign him, our recruitment policy has been all over the place recently and a decent DOF is a priority.
Balikwisha. Say no more. The most expensive b-team failure.
Nothing the Sevco hordes, or their friends in the media, can say frightens me more than our own shit style of backpass anti-football does.
Celtic could lose that game and still win the league, but that would depend on us winning our last 2 games and other results going in our favour.
If Motherwell take something from The Diets on Saturday night then our game against Sevco on Sunday gets magnified 100 times.
Also, anyone else sick of the media constantly asking MON who he wants to win in certain games? MON brings a lot of it on himself. He should be telling these b@st@rds to grow up and go and ask Rhol and McInnes the same questions. He should be telling them i’m the manager of Celtic, i want Celtic to win. And as for any other games? They will take care of themselves. I’m here to talk about Celtic, nobody else.
Also, we should all be ready to scrutinise our game on Sunday like never before. Every decision made by the officials should be put under the microscope. And if there’s ANY incompetence or “honest mistakes” then our board need to raise merry hell. But those cowardly parasites will sit on their arses and do nothing about it. We need to play well enough to make the officials irrelevant.
I’ve a feeling Sevco are going to use every trick in the book. Both fair and foul. Watch for the penalty box diving etc. Our players need to be aware of this, especially Scales who has a habit of pulling and grabbing opponents shirts etc. They will also seek to get as many freekicks as they can just outside our box. Something everyone knows we’re shit at defending.
James, your site seems to have been taken over by The Zionist supporting, Unionist British Labour Party, kidding on they’re Scottish, and looking for our votes. As an ex member and Labour voter until Blair and Brown went to war in Iraq, and then gave the banks billions of pounds of tax payers money, rather than nationalising them, they’ll never get my vote again.
Micmac, what is your issue with Zionism? Do you even know what it is? Putting aside the murder of Jews on oct 7th and the horrors taking place in Palestine for now…why do you think there shouldn’t be a small jewish state in the middle east where they can feel safe?
I presume you have no issue with the many islamic states in Asia or the middle east, because you never talk about them if you do? These are all places of great oppression, violent mysoginism, and anti gay would be a massive understatement.
Look at Jordan that borders Israel, considered a moderate islamic state. Not a single jew lives in Jordan. How do you feel about that micmac?
Maybe you think that is normal or maybe you dont care?
You and others spout bile about Israel but say nothing about saudi where you are happy for us to take players from.
Its ok for Brendan and Jota to go to saudi where half the citizens are oppressed, but Israel where woman and gays are equal, is portrayed as a people of evil. We are even portraying Robbie Keane as some sort of pantomime monster ffs!
If you know your history!!!!
Mojorism, there was no Jewish state for 2000 years in the Middle East, for American and European Jews to suddenly turn up with the backing of the US, British and French States to colonise land that didn’t belong to them, was wrong and has led to bloodshed in that region for 80 years.
I don’t believe in any Official State Religion, I do believe in tolerance and I accept that there is a lot of intolerance in certain Islamic States and of course I don’t agree with this. Maybe you don’t realise but under Saddam Hussain in Iraq and the Assads in Syria there were Christian and Jewish communities in both those countries, plus a sizeable Christian community in Palestine who have suffered an are suffering along with other Palestinians persecution by Israel. To be quite honest I really think it is you who doesn’t know the history of that region, including the violence and murders carried out by Zionist terrorists in the years leading up to the founding of the State of Israel in 1948. I can assure you I know the difference between a Zionist and a non Zionist person of the Jewish faith. I detest anyone who uses violence in the name of any religion.
? agreed
The ? Was supposed to be a thumbs up.
Still agree with you
You have really watered that down micmac. Woman are 2nd class citizens in every islamic state. No jews live in Jordan. A handful in Egypt and Saudi. Do you even know why that is micmac? I guess you don’t care.
You say there was no Jewish state for 2,000 years ..so what?Jews needed somewhere they could be safe.
There was zero Islamic states 2,000 years ago micmac. In fact there was zero Muslims!
With 100s of millions living in Islamic states, all ruled by oppressors of woman and gays…why cant there be one small Jewish state where Jewish people can feel safe?
It astonishes me how strong the jews are. A tiny nation surrounded by millions of people that believe they shouldn’t exist at all.
I hate seeing Celtic linked with antisemitism micmac and make no mistake… no jew will play for us in the foreseeable future!
I read many of your posts from afar mojorisin, you do seem to come across as quite an antagonistic type of character, very much in the ‘I know best’ camp. You obviously have strong views and that’s ok, but you don’t seem to handle people who have different views from you very well in my opinion, it’s never really a debate with you, it’s usually you being quite condescending and telling people they are wrong. This of course is just my opinion, you are free to disagree 🙂
I’ve nothing against Keane being appointed manager, and it should be based based only on his coaching and managerial experience and knowledge.
mr mojorisin , if you know yer recent history zionism is responsible for all the trouble in the middle east stretching from libya to iran bought and paid for by jewish billionaires , the cause of all the migration in to europe , they have also managed to divert the nutter jihadis attention to europe and christians as pre 911 it was only israel who they had a beef with i could go on and don’t take my word for it , most of the above come’s from a very decent human being by the name of jeffrey sachs , himself a jew
Thats the sort of propaganda that came out in 1930s nazi Germany bertie.
Would you also blame zionism for the oppression of woman and persecution of gays in islamic states like Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan & Qatar?
Bertie, do you know it is illegal to be gay in Dubai, do you blame Israel for that?… or is Dubai the sort of place you would go on holiday?
Jeffrey Sachs has different views about different things some which I find credible. He is a clever man, an American who chooses to live in America…also a multi millionaire jew himself.
America is one of the few countries where jews feel safe.
Some jews are currently leaving the UK, they feel Israel is safer for jews than the UK which is astonishing!
And untrue.
The article’s most important sentence is “If Celtic show up for business, Celtic will win.”. Since January, we have, on the whole, been terrible, scraping through, just, at the end. But the last few weeks, we have definitely been much better, Maeda has started to show an interest again, Johnston is back, Engels is back and Iheanacho can contribute for 35 mins.
The worry, as always with Celtic is the defence, but at least a few of the Gers players must be on the beach already. So I think we have a tremendous chance of winning by two, maybe 3 goals.
When criticising “Sacred Cows” there will always be a backlash from its worshippers but here goes.
Calum MacGregor has been responsible for the downturn in performance ever since he came back from that prolonged injury. No one else! Every week someone will say he is the heart and soul of the team, he is the master who controls the play while saying the play is turgid and pathetic.
I now forgive Rodgers for his style of play as I don’t think any of the last four managers could do anything about getting CMG to put a positive spin on things. His insistence of the “short back and sides” style allows the opposition to get organised and the lack of opportunity to shoot is due to the that fact.
I believe he shafted Nancy who probably tried to attempt a different approach but was dragged down by the “governor” (as in the car)
Only when MON took him off did the team mange to rally in extra time as his poison dissipated. He threatened to go if the board didn’t act! I would go further and say if he is still here next season it will be the same crap even if Pep came in and signed Messi and Neymar.
There I have said it. Fire at will.
Bollocks
Not one of CMG’s only fans can outline what he brings to the side.
I’m not at all worried in any way regarding the huns game, well not as long as the Ginger Witch predicts a Celtic victory, for if she does you can take that to the bank. 🙂
JG, a genuine question. Who is the ginger witch? Lennon?
Paulina
This is fuckin WAR for Sevco fans on Sunday…
They are getting frenzied already about it on Wallow Wallow…
Not hiding the boot, maim, break legs planning either…
Nothing else matters to them…
All will be forgiven if they win…
Please don’t give them their greatest desire Martin and Bhoys !
Not a scottish player in the team and a dead rubber? Where is the motivation coming from i ask you.
This is a site for football mojo and i called you out before as a moron .
Your ” leaving aside the murders of jews and the situation in palestine for now” marks you as not only a moron but a dangerous one at .
Leave this site to football ,same to you micmac . There are other places for other topics , name them and am happy to meet you head on in debate.
eldraco…Celtic Park should be a place for football also. You already have lain down your colours on this football site blaming the Jewish community for the murders at Bondi in Australia and you call me dangerous ffs!
Your ” leaving aside the murders of jews and the situation in palestine for now” ….but of course I never said that and it is a deliberate misquote by you or maybe you consider yourself a moron also?…I dont know
Sevco are NOT out of this! With the help of the Brethren they could get a result at Parkhead putting them one behind us. Motherwell are capable of beating Hearts, leaving Sevco four behind them. Then it’s squeaky bum time. If Hearts draw against Falkirk(who have beaten them already this season) and we beat them on the last day Hearts will be on 77 pts. If we lose or draw to Motherwell and beat Hearts we’ll be on 76 or 77 pts. If they beat Hibs and Falkirk they’ll be on 78 pts. Lots of “ifs” in there but none of them are outrageous.
Having said that, I expect us to do the business this weekend. I think their spirit is broken and although they’ll put a lot into this game I think it’ll manifest in lots of kicking and late tackles rather than clever football. I’m more worried about the performance of the officials and I’m hoping that a vocal home crowd will subdue them a bit.