Celtic can go 9 points clear before title foes play next

Celtic have a golden opportunity ahead of them after yesterday’s sensational 2-1 win over Rangers at Ibrox.

The Hoops as we all know have Rangers right where we want them. With only 6 games remaining, we boast a monumental 6 point gap over them. Not to mention the incredible goal difference stat that sees us sit 16 goals ahead of our rivals. That’s as good as an extra point at this stage.

Yesterday was as big a psychological blow Celtic have dealt Rangers in a long time. But all of a sudden, we have a major opportunity to hammer home another this weekend.

Celtic will host St Johnstone on Saturday afternoon at Parkhead in what’s now become a massive fixture. 3 points against the Saints and we’ll be 9 points clear at the top with that superior goal difference in mind. That will have Rangers travelling to St Mirren the next day knowing the pressure is right back on them once more.

They’ll likely already be heading to Paisley utterly demoralised. Especially if Braga can turn them over in Portugal on Thursday night in the Europa League too. All of a sudden, they would be going to Paisley knowing anything less than 3 points and even the faintest of hope for them would be up in smoke.

This continues to be a Rangers side that doesn’t like pressure. It’s not one that reacts well to adversity. Just look at how easily their title challenge has crumbled in 2022.

Celtic have Rangers exactly where they want them as the finishing line races towards us

Many will have Rangers down as bagging a routine looking 3 points at Ibrox. But let’s be quite honest, they’re in no position to think any match is guaranteed. Let’s not forget it took them until the 86th minute to find a winner against the worst team in the league in Dundee over a fortnight ago.

St Mirren have already caused Rangers some problems this season. Back in October, the Buddies took the lead against the Ibrox side and ran them close despite ultimately losing out 2-1.

If Celtic can get the job done against St Johnstone, it puts our rivals in an absolutely horrible position. Not to mention the biggest danger for a side that wins a Glasgow derby match is how they react in their next game.

Should Celtic drop points against Saints, it’ll open up a new title narrative once more. It’ll have the media bigging up a collapse whilst Rangers will, internally, be talking up the idea of putting pressure on us. But a win, on the other hand, would show that we mean business and we’re not going to get complacent just because we won at Ibrox.

This is an absolutely huge game on Saturday. Beating St Johnstone at Parkhead will drastically reduce the work we need to do to secure the title. If both Celtic and Rangers win this weekend, we’ll still only need 3 wins from the final 5 games at most. Even then the other 2 would need to be defeats.

Imagine, then, what beating St Johnstone would do for Rangers’ mindset heading into their game against Stephen Robinson’s side. It’s set up for another spicy weekend, and don’t discount Celtic extending their advantage if they swat St Johnstone aside.

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