Ibrox side Glasgow Rangers slipped 16 points behind their Old Firm rivals on Wednesday.
Rangers slipped 16 points behind Scottish Premiership leaders Celtic after being held to a 1-1 draw at St Johnstone on Wednesday night.
Barry McKay opened the scoring for the Gers on 23 minutes but it was swiftly cancelled out by Steven MacLean shortly afterwards.
The hosts were gifted a route back into the match when Robbie Kiernan’s suicidal back-pass was pounced on by MacLean, who tapped home the equaliser.
It was not the way in which Rangers would have wanted to approach the visit of Celtic at Ibrox on Saturday afternoon, and Hoops legend Chris Sutton put the boot into their “toothless” display and criticised Kiernan in the process.
The pre-match soundbites from Rangers had centered around the idea that all the focus was on St Johnstone, with manager Mark Warburton and Martyn Waghorn claiming that they didn’t have one eye on the Old Firm this weekend.
But the performance sort of betrayed those comments. It seemed as if the Blues did, in fact, have something else on their minds and it will be very tough for Warburton to rally the troops now.
Psychologically, Celtic have the beating of the Gers. Not only do they boast a 16-point lead – and with a game in hand, too – but Rangers have lost their last two matches with Brendan Rodgers’s side – and pretty convincingly, it must be said, even if the last one was only 1-0.
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