It has been another domestic season to forget for Rangers, who have been stuck in a cycle of sacking a manager annually since this last title win due to their inability to keep pace with Celtic. Brendan Rodgers is looking to collect his 11th trophy as Celtic manager, and after knocking a tough Hibs side out of the Scottish Cup last weekend, his side are huge favourites to win yet another domestic treble this season, such is their stranglehold over Scottish football.
There is a welcomed development off the pitch ahead of this tie, as the impasse between the two Glasgow giants was finally broken to allow away fans into an Old Firm match for the first time since January 2023. The atmosphere will undoubtedly be improved by having a mix of fans, but the 4% of capacity dedicated to the away end still has some way to go as historically around 7,000 away fans were allowed to occupy a large proportion of the ground.
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Celtic have been afforded the ease of focusing solely on domestic football after running Bayern Munich incredibly close in the Champions League play-off round. Celtic looked set to take the tie to extra-time after being arguably the better side at the Allianz in Germany, before a stoppage time shot was parried into Alphonso Davies’ path for him to send Bayern through. Celtic returned to league action with a loss at third force Hibs, but failure to capitalise on this loss against St Mirren was ultimately the final nail in the coffin for Rangers manager Philippe Clement. Celtic responded to this setback in their usual dominant fashion, putting 5 past Aberdeen and St Mirren before getting revenge on Hibs by dumping them out of the Scottish Cup quarter-final to seal a spot at Hampden in the semis.
Rangers’ solace in recent years since their dip in domestic form has been their Thursday nights in Europa League action. They yet again dumped out a team with a budget multiple times that of the Govan side, as Jose Mourinho’s Fenerbahce were the latest side to suffer a Europa League defeat to the Gers. Rangers now have a tie against Athletic Club de Bilbao to look forward to in April, which provides a good tonic for their disastrous domestic form. Despite going through against Fener, Rangers suffered their 4th successive defeat in 90 minutes at Ibrox for the first time in their history. Rangers haven’t kept a clean sheet in their 7 matches since the start of February, and must quickly switch their focus to an Old Firm match away at Celtic that is always monumental regardless of the points gap between the sides in the league table.
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Celtic will be without the services of Paulo Bernardo and James Forrest, who remain injured. Captain Callum McGregor was forced to sit out of training on Friday after being withdrawn in the win against Hibs last weekend. Rodgers has been known to play mind games with his injury updates before big games, so don’t be surprised to see McGregor with the armband on come Sunday. Other than this, a relatively light schedule sees the Celts go into Sunday’s tie with fresh legs and in prime position to assert themselves over their city rivals.
Rangers had a weekend off between the Fenerbahce matches due to their being knocked out of the Scottish Cup by Queen’s Park, but any rest advantage this would’ve provided has been eliminated as Rangers played out a battling 120 minutes and penalties as Fener managed to take the tie to extra time on Thursday. Connor Barron suffered an injury due to this exertion, while Oscar Cortes remains unavailable to the first team after a lengthy injury. Balogun and Souttar played all 120 minutes despite only returning from long injuries the week before, and may find it hard to recover fully in time for Sunday. Robin Propper, Hamza Igamane, Nedim Bajrami and Ianis Hagi all played fewer than 60 minutes in Thursday’s tie so may be rotation options for Barry Ferguson on Sunday.
Stats Watch:
- Tight Head-to-Head Record: With this match being one of the biggest and most historic derbies in the world, the head-to-head record befits this standing. In the 444 meetings between the sides, both teams have remarkably won 170 matches each.
- Rodgers Dominant: Brendan Rodgers has a strong record in Old Firm derbies, having won 71% of his 21 matches against Rangers across his two tenures.
- Spread of Quality: One of Celtic’s main strengths is the depth of strength in their squad. This is exemplified by RB Alistair Johnston, RW Nicolas Kuhn and LW Daizen Maeda all being tied at the top of the Scottish Premiership assists table on 7 assists.
- Rangers Potent Right Side: Despite the three above Celtic players leading the way on assists, Rangers right side dominates the chance creation stats. RW Vaclav Cerny (66) and RB James Tavernier (54) are the top two players in the Scottish Premiership for chance creation.
While Celtic are as close to guaranteed to winning the league as you can be before it is mathematically certain, the stakes are always massive in the Glasgow cauldron. Rodgers will be looking to boost his Old Firm record again after Rangers won 3-0 at Ibrox in January. Ferguson has shown that he is willing to tinker with systems in his interim position and is incredibly experienced in this fixture from his playing days, so we may well see some surprises from Rangers on Sunday. Glasgow is bracing itself for what should be another hugely entertaining Old Firm Derby.