Celtic v the Rangers – A Hampden cauldron ready to witness who blinks first | OneFootball

Tomorrow, Celtic escape, if only briefly, the grinding pressures of chasing a leader in the Scottish Premiership…

Tynecastle. Hearts v Celtic, 26 October 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

And with Hearts playing Dundee at Tynecastle this afternoon they could increase their lead over Celtic to NINE points and in the case of theRangers they’d be 14 points behind the leaders if Hearts win today. Maybe Dundee could do us both a wee favour?

It’s been a strange season, a maddening one, with underperformance on the pitch, raging politics off it, and now a managerial exit. Celtic find themselves in transition for the first time in a long time.

Callum McGregor shakes hands with Brendan Rodgers. Hearts v Celtic, 26 October 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

Perhaps the worry, then, is that, like debating with an idiot, you risk being dragged down to their level, only to find the idiot has far more experience in that environment.

Across the city at Ibrox, the latest incarnation of the club playing out of that old stadium is no less turbulent. theRangers are already on their second manager of the season. Russell Martin, it turns out, was not the Messiah but another naughty boy, not wanted from the start by a support that quickly decided he didn’t ‘get it.’

New Rangers Head Coach Russell Martin ninth dressing room at Ibrox Stadium. Russell Martin unveiled as the new…PhotoIMAGO / Shutterstock

It’s an all-too-familiar tale, another English manager arriving with bright ideas about how Scottish football can be ‘enlightened,’ leaving with his ego dented and his reputation damaged. Too often they come north from the lower reaches of English football believing they can illuminate the Scottish game. It rarely ends well.

theRangers Unveil New Manager Danny Röhl at Ibrox Stadium on October 21, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Now theRangers have turned to Danny Röhl. He’s young, articulate, modern in his methods, and, for now, unbeaten domestically at least. The early days have been positive, but the pressure has yet to properly arrive. Tomorrow it will, in the most unforgiving of fixtures, a Hampden semi-final, and a Glasgow Derby no less. There are no gentle introductions when Celtic are on the other side of the halfway line.

Celtic has been staggering all season, undercooked, underwhelming, and under the constant drone of politics. The title race has become a background hum of gnawing anxiety. Then the manager walked, and suddenly the whole place felt like it was now running on fumes.

Martin O’Neill arrives after the announcement that former Celtic Manager was returning to the club as interim manager, following yesterday’s surprise resignation of Brendan Rodgers, at Celtic Park on October 28, 2025 (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Enter Martin O’Neill, the old alchemist, the man who can talk panic into patience. He’s barely had time to find his office, but already he’s calmed the storm, somewhat at least. Four-nil against Falkirk midweek, a free-flowing, chaotic joyride of a performance. It wasn’t pretty, but it was a lot of fun, and that’s something Celtic Park hasn’t seen for too many months.

This, though, is a derby framed by chaos. One club saw off their manager with the assistance of a police escort, the other delivered a public evisceration of theirs on the club website. Neither departure spoke of stability. Both clubs are unmistakably in flux, under reconstruction, uncertain of direction, desperate for something, anything, that looks like momentum.

Between them, they’ve turned managerial exits into performance art. The PR teams are sweating, the fans are twitching, and both boards are pretending this is all part of some grand evolution. It’s not. It’s crisis management.

The cliché insists that ‘form goes out the window’ in these fixtures, but that’s rarely true. Most derbies go exactly to form. The problem this time is that neither side has any to speak of.

St Johnstone v Celtic, Scottish Cup semi-final at Hampden Park on Sunday 20 April 2025. Photo by Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

This, then, is the Transition Derby, the Going-In-Blind Derby, the Two Bald Men Fighting Over a Comb Derby. Whoever wins might just find direction in the aftermath. The loser? Well, Glasgow doesn’t do quiet collapses.

Two clubs with no real sense of who they are at the moment, facing each other in a semi-final that could define the next phase of their seasons. For the winner, it might be the spark that ignites consistency and renewed purpose. For the loser, a tailspin could easily follow.

Two giants, both in therapy, both pretending they’ve got their act together. One city, one cauldron, and a semi-final that might just decide who comes out of their fog first.

The stakes, as ever in Glasgow, are enormous. But perhaps what makes this one fascinating is not dominance or momentum, it’s the uncertainty. Two clubs in transition, one city, and one Hampden cauldron ready to witness who blinks first.

Niall J

Celtic in the Eighties by David Potter, signed copies by Danny McGrain available from celticstarbooks.com

Don’t miss the chance to purchase the late, great Celtic historian David Potter’s final book. All remaining copies have been signed by the legendary Celtic captain  Danny McGrain PLUS you’ll also receive a FREE copy of David Potter’s Willie Fernie biography – Putting on the Style, and you’ll only be charged for postage on one book.  Order from Celtic Star Books HERE.

Celtic in the Eighties and Willie Fernie – Putting on the Style both by David Potter. Photo The Celtic Star

Danny McGrain signing copies of Celtic in the Eighties by David Potter. Photo: Celtic Star Books

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