CELTIC will head across the River Clyde to play Rangers at Ibrox on Thursday with a 14 point lead over their city rivals in the William Hill Premiership following an emphatic 4-0 win over struggling St Johnstone at Parkhead today.
With no fewer than 33 points separating the top and bottom placed sides in the league table, it would have been a major surprise if the hosts had failed to prevail this afternoon.
However, Brendan Rodgers’ much-changed side still produced a professional all-round performance in occasionally difficult wet and windy conditions and secured the victory their supporters had turned out in force to see.
A fine first half Nicolas Kuhn goal gave Celtic the lead and they wrapped up the triumph after half-time thanks to a double from Kyogo Furuhashi and a well-worked Daizen Maeda strike.
With Rangers being held to a draw by Motherwell in a four goal thriller over at Fir Park, the defending Scottish champions extended their already commanding advantage in the league with the result.
It now looks, even though it is still only December, inevitable they will be celebrating a fourth consecutive title come May.
Here are five talking points from another positive afternoon for the Glasgow giants.
AJ OK
Alistair Johnston returned to the Celtic side for the first time since limping off injured in the Premier Sports Cup final against Rangers at Hampden earlier this month.
Johnston’s understudy Anthony Ralston ensured the Glasgow club recorded three consecutive victories in his absence. But supporters were pleased to see the Canadian internationalist back on the park with another derby looming. He has once again been one of their most consistent performers this term.
The right-back linked well with Kuhn, who had himself returned to action after a brief lay-off when he came off the bench during the week, on his flank and overlapped to good effect. He teed up Furuhashi for a shot and got a header on target during the opening 45 minutes and did not let up after half-time.
Rodgers will be hoping the defender shows no adverse reaction to his runout in training in the coming days and is available for selection for their next outing.
Strength in depth
The Northern Irishman, with half an eye on the Rangers match in midweek, made no fewer than five changes to the team that swatted aside Motherwell at home on Boxing Day.
He replaced left-back Greg Taylor, his captain Callum McGregor, winger Daizen Maeda and striker Adam Idah with Alex Valle, Reo Hatate, Kuhn and Furuhashi respectively. The new-look side experienced no difficulties wrapping up the three points.
Every member of his side played their part in the win. Arne Engels, the Belgian midfielder who has at times struggled to show it required an £11m fee to secure his services this summer, was lively and set up the third before being replaced.
He was a worthy winner of the Man of the Match award at the end of the 90 minutes.
Saints woes
Simo Valakari showed what he thought of St Johnstone’s display in their 2-1 reverse to Dundee United at McDiarmid Park earlier this week with his team selection – he dropped Jason Holt, Graham Carey, Drey Wright, Benjamin Kimpioka and David Keltjens and drafted in Andre Raymond, Nicky Clark, Aaron Essel, Matt Smith and Fran Franczak.
The Finn switched to a 3-5-1-1 formation which saw centre-halves Bozo Mikulic, Kyle Cameron and Jack Sanders joined in defence by wing-backs Andre Raymond and Fran Franczak.
But the Perth outfit had goalkeeper Josh Rae to thank for keeping the scoreline down and their chances of salvaging a result alive in the first half. The Scot did well to deny Arne Engels, Kuhn, Valle and Johnston.
Valakari made a triple substitution at the start of the second half and threw on Adama Sidibeh, Kimpioka and Lewis Neilson for Essel, Makenzie Kirk and Clark. But the replacements made no difference to proceedings. His charges fell four down after allowing Furuhashi to net a double and substitute Maeda to get in on the act.
St Johnstone are now three points behind second bottom Hearts. They will need to have a good January transfer window and strengthen in every department to avoid automatic relegation this term.
Festive fan fun
There will be no Celtic fans in attendance in Govan once again on Thursday - so they made sure they wound up their Rangers counterparts this afternoon as the Ibrox club dropped points for the second time in four days.
There were excited cheers around the ground as news filtered through from North Lanarkshire that Philippe Clement’s side had fallen two goals down and an impromptu Huddle broke out in the safe-standing section.
There were chants of “Here we go to 10-In-A-Row” as well as “F*** you Rangers, we’re going to win the league” and “Bring on the Rangers” as the game reached its inevitable conclusion.
Stellar year
This one-sided victory rounded off what has, even by their own high standards, been an exceptional year for Celtic.
The Parkhead club only lost two of the 50 games which they played in all competitions in 2024. They were beaten by Hearts at Tynecastle in the Premiership in March and by Borussia Dortmund in Germany in the Champions League at the start of October.
It will be hard for McGregor and his team mates to top that in 2025 – but they will be looking to complete a world-record ninth domestic treble and reached the knockout rounds of Europe’s elite club competition in the coming months.
