Remarkable Rangers intensity wins derby day against Celtic in Scottish Cup
- Published
Highlights: Celtic 1-2 Rangers
In the 114th minute of Sunday's tumultuous Scottish Cup semi-final, Calvin Bassey - a centre-back who played every second of Rangers' 120-minuter against Braga on Thursday night - metamorphosed into a left winger and put in the cross that led to the winner against Celtic and sparked thunderous scenes at Hampden down the blue end of the stadium.
Bassey is only 22 and entitled to be as fit as a flea, but what he did in that moment wasn't just about superior conditioning, it was about desire and a rage for victory that typified Rangers' effort on the day.
It was about going toe-to-toe with an opponent that was unbeaten in 34 domestic games before this one, about downing a side that hadn't lost to a Scottish opponent in almost seven months, about doing whatever needed to be done to overcome a rival that had visited some gloomy days on Rangers already this year.
It's hard to single out one Rangers player in all of this because most of them turned up at Hampden in steely mood. It's fair to say there is not wholesale agreement on both sides of the divide about the tactics that Rangers deployed out there - absolutely heroic and on the right side of the law or, alternatively, thunderously illegal and shamelessly unpunished, take your pick.
What is a day like this without bitterness and rancour? And what a day this was. Trippy and exhausting.
Thursday night was expected to have a big say on what happened at Hampden. In a way, it did, but not necessarily in the expected manner. Rangers were not ground down by the effort it took to beat Braga, as many thought. Instead, they were inspired by it. They fed off the adrenaline that the win gave them. They looked a side not just physically strong but mentally strong. Their psychology was fascinating.
The world of sport is full of coaches who talk psychobabble about the mind of the elite athlete and how the best ones can convince themselves that they're not tired when they actually are. The true God of endurance, they'll tell you, is not the body but the brain. Fatigue is no match for positive thinking if you truly believe that anything is possible.
Maybe they have a point. Maybe Giovanni van Bronckhorst's players gorged themselves on this stuff in the days since their 120-minuter against Braga 63 hours earlier. Whatever physical and psychological work they did before this game, it worked.
Robust Rangers defy expectation
Onlookers kept waiting for Rangers to wilt, but they didn't. Signs that the price of that European exertion was about to be paid domestically never really came - or, if they did, they came and went pretty quickly.
At times, it was like a movie everyone had seen before. Kemar Roofe flashed a snapshot just past Joe Hart's post. Roofe had an attempt blocked by Carl Starfelt. On the follow-up, Joe Aribo failed to test Hart. John Lundstram saw his shot come slapping back off a post. Aribo had a glancing header go wide. Rangers domination and no goal to show for it. Not the first time that's happened.
When Celtic scored, plenty would have put their last fiver on Rangers' race being run. It was a sickener. They'd been the better side, but were now behind. And Kyogo Furuhashi was on the pitch.
Celtic's fans were rocking. Even when Rangers equalised, there was a sense that the demands of extra-time would do for them, that finally all those minutes would have an impact. Time and again they defied expectation. Bassey donning the mask of a winger in the run-up to Starfelt's own goal was the decisive act. Remarkable.
Calvin Bassey's cross towards Fashion Sakala led to Rangers' winner
Celtic never settled because they were never allowed to settle. From the moment Lundstram mugged Reo Hatate of possession in the second minute, Rangers had an edge and an aggression about them that Celtic found hard to live with. Their robustness was a constant theme.
The deadly fluency that Celtic are capable of? It didn't appear. Their influential match-winners? Snuffed out at source. Players that visited serious hardship on Rangers in recent months were neutralised. Rangers' intensity won the day.
Those from the east end of Glasgow might look at that intensity as a euphemism for cynicism. There was plenty of that. Again, it's in the eye of the beholder. If it's your team doing it, it's a reflection of their fantastic will to win. If it's the other lot then it's anti-football and needs to be called out.
The ultimate example of it came five minutes into the second half when Daizen Maeda took off towards the Rangers goal with Celtic men running free to his left and to his right. The semi-final was still goalless, but this looked like an interesting moment. Celtic had found precious little space in behind their rival to that point, but here they were. Opportunity was knocking at last.
Roofe appreciated the danger and dived in. His intervention brought Maeda crashing to the floor and brought a yellow card from referee Bobby Madden's pocket. It also brought tumult among the Celtic support who didn't appreciate the aggression of their city neighbours or the leniency shown by the man in the middle, but to Roofe, it was all part of the game plan. Live on the edge. Upset and spoil. Twice they'd played nice against Celtic in the league this season and twice they'd been beaten. Nice wasn't cutting it at Hampden.
Celtic still in control for double trophy haul
Ange Postecoglou and Callum McGregor are still on course to win two trophies with Celtic this season
Rangers lived in Celtic's face all afternoon. Afterwards, Ange Postecoglou was asked if he thought that the winners had been allowed to get away with fouls that might have brought cards of different colours, but the Celtic manager, more downcast than we've ever seen him, wasn't going there.
"I don't think there was anything untoward," he said of the tackles and the decisions made. That was a classy reaction, although not all among his support will be so stoic. The treble that some among the Celtic support might have banked in their subconscious mind is now gone, but there are still fascinating weeks ahead - and major questions to be answered.
Will this defeat shake Celtic in the title run-in, or will they find resilience in it? Is there a twist in the tale of the title race just as there was a changing of the narrative in this cup tie? Celtic are still well in control at the top of the Premiership and they're still favourites to finish the season with a handsome haul of two trophies - the biggest trophy among them.
But it was clear this loss cut Postecolgou deep. Looking at Rangers folk, meanwhile, left one in no doubt about how they were feeling. On the euphoria scale from one to 10, for them, this was an 11.