The ‘Rangers’ cannot even win with dignity. Their abuse of Martin O’Neill is why Celtic must exact revenge on them next Sunday

When your side is 3-0 up and cruising against your arch rivals, you’d think the overriding feeling would be one of Euphoria.

Not so at Ibrox.

The ‘Rangers’ don’t do winning with dignity.

It’s not good enough that they’re getting one over on their hated rivals, no.

Instead of celebrating in the fashion that normal teams celebrate in, they had to enforce their warped worldview on the 30 or so personnel representing Celtic at Ibrox last Sunday.

But the main target of their black sectarian hatred was a 74 year old pensioner.

In victory – and thoroughly deserved victory – the Rangers fans shower Martin O’Neill with sectarian abuse.

— Graham Spiers (@GrahamSpiers) September 13, 2026

Now everybody gloats in victory, especially a victory against your main rivals.

However, most fanbases do it in amusing ways rather than what was witnessed at Ibrox last Sunday

As I said, they just cannot win with dignity over there.

Now, I could go into the fact that if a fan group sang songs about other religious groups, it wouldn’t be accepted, and it would be highlighted in the correct manner.

But I’m not going to.

It’s a pointless exercise because nothing ever changes in Scotland.

Nothing will be done about what happened on Sunday, it never is.

But what I do want to add is a bit of context to the whole situation.

The warped view of the SFA brings into sharp contrast how disconnected they are from the reality of the Scottish game, and the imbalance with which they handle certain situations.

When a team decides to celebrate a hard fought victory, and a handful of their fans enter the pitch in a state of Euphoria, this is punishable by enforcing a stadium lockout.

In addition to that, the same sanction is enforced on the team that entered the pitch to hurt and maim those celebrating fans.

There is a slight imbalance there, don’t you think?

But when fans of the Ibrox side blatantly broke the law last Sunday by singing both the Famine song, and the Billy Boys, where are the sanctions?

Where are the stadium closures?

I mean in a normal society, a club that is already on notice for a violent pitch invasion should be subject to further more severe sanctions if they persist in continuing to break the law, shouldn’t they?

Not so in Scotland.

Because abusing a 74 year old manager, and singing songs riddled with anti-Catholic hatred is perfectly fine and acceptable.

Perfectly acceptable in the 21st century.

At a time where people can be arrested and imprisoned if anti-religious hatred is found on their electronic devices.

But those laws don’t seem to apply inside the confines of Ibrox.

It is a place where this sort of behaviour is both promoted and permitted.

Explain that one to me?

Now, I have no doubt that Martin O’Neill rose above the abuse directed at him at Ibrox.

It wouldn’t be the first time he’s been subjected to it.

He knows what to expect from the Ibrox crowd.

I’m sure he also understands that it is not in their DNA to win with dignity.

There are plenty of examples of this down through the years.

None more so than the May 1999 mocking of the huddle by the dead club’s players after they won the title at Celtic Park.

Rangers players celebrate lifting the title at Celtic Park with a mock 'Huddle' in May 1999. Pic: Daily Record pic.twitter.com/tTKv5pp7u0

— PictureThis Scotland (@74frankfurt) June 24, 2017

Martin O’Neill understand this, but it doesn’t mean that he has to accept it.

Ibrox fans will tell their own that the staunch pivot is working for them, and it drove them onto victory last Sunday.

And that staunch Del will be the one to lead them onto victory

Martin O’Neill needs to regroup his battered troops and use his experience from Sunday to ensure there is no repeat of what happened that day.

He needs to ensure that Celtic do their talking where it matters.

On the field of play.

The Celtic fans will do their job.

They’ll be fully behind Martin and the boys come Sunday.

But let’s be clear about one thing, we need to put the boot into staunch on Sunday.

We need to do our talking on the pitch.

We will exact revenge in the only way we know how, and we’ll let our football do the talking for us.

If we don’t, the warped world view of that club will be given further oxygen.

And we cannot, under any circumstances, allow that to happen.

This, amongst other reasons, is why Sunday is must win situation.

Nothing less will suffice.

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