2011-04-24: Rangers 0-0 Celtic, SPL

Trivia

• Rangers stay 1pt ahead; but we have one game in hand; 5 games left for us.
• Game comes in wake of a bomb threat, package sent to our manager and two others see: link.
• Samaras missed a penalty! We should have had another early on. Diouf had chance to win match at the death with a free kick but thankfully missed.
• 'What's it like to live in fear?' was the chant Rangers supporters were saying to Lennon at the end of game. That's why he cupped his ears.

Review

Why didn't Common's take the penalty? Samaras took it and fluffed it. Rangers goalkeeper was MOTM, but we could have got the win but the scoreline says it all in some ways.

We got a soft penalty but this balances out with the one not given in the first half.

This is not going to be an easy run-in. Rangers may be bankrupt/skint/whatever else but this match showed that on the pitch they aren't any worse or better for results.

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• Match Report (see end of page below)
• Audio Report: Paradise Report

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KStreet

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MOTM

• Voting Thread
• Result Thread
• Winner –
• 2010-11 Winners

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Articles

Matt Dickinson Chief Sports Correspondent The Times

It was the game of zero tolerance against sectarianism, when police snatch squads would target troublemakers at Ibrox in the aftermath of the bomb sent to Neil Lennon, the Celtic manager.
A day when Rangers and Celtic would stand united against any form of bigotry or intolerance and instruct their supporters to focus on the football. Enough was, finally, enough.
So what did Rangers do? They allowed a small Union Jack flag to be placed in every seat of a home supporter.
There were 40,000 of these flags, supplied by the Rangers Supporters Assembly, and every one approved by the club hierarchy.
I rang Rangers yesterday to ask why, exactly? The Union Jack is not an official symbol of Rangers FC. It is not part of the club badge, not on the shirt. It is not to be found on any page of the Rangers website.
A shirty spokesman, dismissing the inquiry as a nonsense, said that it was the flag of his country and the British Isles. But there are dozens of British clubs and none of the others ever hand out Union Jacks.
If Rangers wanted to give the team a show of support, why not simply hand out regular club flags and scarves?
Why endorse a provocative symbol of tribalism, on the very day when both clubs were meant to be going out of their way to calm their fans?
The spokesman could not wait to get off the phone, although, before he did so, he pointed out that Rangers had no intention of complaining about the tricolours flown by the Celtic supporters. As if that made everything all right.
Apologists will say that the Union Jack is only a flag, a common one, and not an incitement to send parcel bombs to football managers. But it has nothing whatsoever to do with football.
In the context of the Old Firm, it has been hijacked as a sign of lasting enmity, of division, entrenching the idea that one club, for now and evermore, will represent the Protestant sector of Glasgow and the other the Catholic.
One club handing out Union Jacks cannot possibly take us any closer to the day, however far away it may be, when Rangers against Celtic becomes a “normal” sporting rivalry, defined by geography, not historical or religious baggage.
A day when the Old Firm becomes like Red against Blue, City against United, Milan against Inter, rather than the poisonous stirring of an ancient religious divide.
The bomb intended for Lennon has focused attention on the murderous imbeciles, but there will always be extremists. The battle is surely more importantly won over the centre ground, the reasonable majority.
This is the job of driving sense into the “90-minute bigots” as they were described in 2005 by Lawrence Macintyre, the head of safety for Rangers at the time, when he talked of fans with Catholic friends and workmates who became filled with hatred on a Saturday afternoon at Ibrox.
“If we can get the person that doesn’t mean it then we’ll isolate the real racists and real bigots in numbers that are manageable to deal with,” he said.
Does anyone seriously believe that the best means of education is for Rangers to hand out Union Jacks?
To make such a point to the club yesterday was to be brushed off like an idiot. But then I met the same dismissiveness when I went to my only Old Firm derby at Ibrox a few years ago and expressed amazement that a giant Union Jack was being waved in the centre circle before kick-off.
It seemed bizarre then and, given the tensions around Lennon, the ritual seemed even more extraordinary on Sunday.
There seems to be an acceptance that these two clubs will always represent a sectarian divide, and the best that can be done is to contain the worst violence and the worst chanting rather than to eradicate the problem altogether.
But it has to be asked whether such an approach will ever make sufficient progress. Many well-intentioned campaigns and initiatives have been launched in recent years, only to founder.
The charity Nil by Mouth was established after the 1995 murder of a young Celtic fan, Sense Over Sectarianism, a joint-initiative, was launched in 2001, and Jack McConnell, then the First Minister, brought together a summit in 2005 that led to tougher legislation. Alex Salmond, the First Minister says the anti-sectarian laws will be toughened further in the coming months.
We can add the Pride over Prejudice campaign launched by Rangers, Bhoys against Bigotry by Celtic and Bigger than Bigotry. No doubt there are others.
The treatment of Lennon, the victim of a street attack in Glasgow in the past as well as having the threat made on his life, suggests that this problem is no closer to being resolved and that the clubs have to take a stronger lead. Condemning bombers is the easy part.
Rangers will insist that they do plenty, but that has not been the impression given in the past 48 hours, on or off the record.

They should pay more attention to their manager, the wise Walter Smith, who talked last week of how the sectarian problem had been tolerated for too long, and his relief that he was retiring. “To be quite honest with you, I’m quite glad to be getting out of it,” Smith said, which was a terribly sad admission from a man steeped in Rangers since he was a lad.
So that is one manager driven away and another who might have been killed. And a stupid club who think there is nothing odd, amid all this trouble, in handing out 40,000 Union Jacks.

Rangers 0 Celtic 0: Samaras misses from the spot as pivotal Old Firm clash ends in stalemate By Sportsmail Reporter

Last updated at 3:25 PM on 24th April 2011Rangers keeper Allan McGregor saved a late penalty from Georgios Samaras as the Old Firm draw a blank in their Clydesdale Bank Premier League clash at Ibrox.

McGregor had made saves from Daniel Majstorovic, Charlie Mulgrew and Emilio Izaguirre before Celtic substitute Anthony Stokes, on for Gary Hooper, won a spot-kick inside the final 10 minutes.

The Scotland number one dived to his left to save the Greece international's effort to keep second-placed Celtic a point behind with a game in hand.
The game took place against a background of heightened security after a parcel bomb was recently sent to Lennon. However, despite calls for calm, there was still a deafening din inside Ibrox at kick-off time.

Celtic had a penalty claim in the seventh minute when Joe Ledley clashed with Ibrox full-back Steven Whittaker in the box but referee Craig Thomson was unimpressed, but no less so than Lennon who turned to gesture in frustration to the main stand.

Moments later Light Blues striker Kyle Lafferty nearly got on the end of a pass from fellow Northern Ireland international Steven Davis as Celtic keeper Fraser Forster and Charlie Mulgrew almost got in to a tangle.

Then, after Rangers' on-form striker Nikica Jelavic had set him up with a chest pass, Maurice Edu's shot from the edge of the box got deflected past for a corner which led to a spell of pressure which Celtic survived.

In the 18th minute another orchestrated show of support for Lennon from the away fans in the Broomloan Road stand came as Rangers continued to press for the opener.
After Samaras pushed Rangers skipper Davie Weir to the ground inside the home side's penalty area, during an altercation which followed the Greece international's challenge on McGregor, both players were booked.

The champions edged possession but in the 26th minute Hoops skipper Scott Brown sent a left-footed drive from 25 yards past McGregor's left-hand post, moments before Steven Naismith's angled-volley from 12 yards missed the target at the other end.

By the time Celtic striker Hooper flashed a drive from the edge of the box high over the bar, the visitors had come back into the game.

Two minutes into the second half Weir headed over a Davis corner before a Naismith volley from the edge of the box was deflected for another corner which came to nothing.

Rangers should have scored in the 51st minute when Gregg Wylde's cross from the left was met by Lafferty but the lanky striker somehow headed past the post from six yards. Seconds later, at the other end, Hoops midfielder Beram Kayal drove inches wide from 20 yards.

Ledley had to come off in the 54th minute after being fouled by Naismith wide on the left and was replaced by Kris Commons.

The Light Blues' defence struggled to clear their lines following the resulting free-kick and needed McGregor to make a great save from Majstorovic's close-range header to keep the game goalless.

Kayal was booked in the 61st minute for fouling Jelavic 30 yards from goal as the Rangers striker broke with purpose after turning Majstorovic on the halfway line and Lafferty fired the free-kick wide.
As the tension increased, Naismith had a left-footed effort from 20 yards which just sped wide before a Mulgrew header from Commons' corner forced another save from McGregor.

In the 75th minute the Rangers keeper made yet another great save, this time from Izaguirre's shot after the Hoops left-back combined well with Samaras inside the Light Blues' penalty area.

There was great drama in the 81st minute when Celtic were awarded a contentious penalty when Celtic substitute Stokes clashed with Davis inside the Rangers penalty area.

Samaras, who had scored a penalty in the 2-0 win at Ibrox at the start of the year, saw his spot kick brilliantly saved by McGregor who dived to his left to push the ball round the post.

There was time for Stokes to be booked for diving having gone to ground after going past Rangers substitute John Fleck.

By Clive Lindsay
BBC Scotland
Rangers goalkeeper Allan McGregor produced a superb penalty save to give the reigning champions a draw with Celtic and keep the title race alive.

Steven Davis was ruled to have fouled Anthony Stokes, but McGregor pushed Georgios Samaras's late spot-kick wide.

The sides kept a lid on a potentially feisty derby during a lively first half that nevertheless produced few chances.

Rangers' Kyle Lafferty flashed a header wide after the break, while McGregor also thwarted Daniel Majstorovic.

Story from BBC SPORT:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/sport1/hi/football/scot_prem/9464454.stm

Published: 2011/04/24 13:36:07 GMT

© BBC 2011