Celtic 3-1 the Rangers – We look like a team again, our team

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The Celtic Star

·3 novembre 2025

Celtic 3-1 the Rangers – We look like a team again, our team

I don’t think any of us will forget that game in a hurry. Celtic 3 Rangers 1, after extra time at Hampden. The Premier Sports Cup semi-final that started like a stress test and ended like an exorcism…

Celtic supporters at Hampden. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

This wasn’t just about football, it was about feeling something again. After the week Celtic had, Brendan Rodgers gone, the staff exodus, the mood amongst the fanbase had felt sour and fragile, and you’d have forgiven everyone connected with the club for just wanting the season to stop and start over.

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Shaun Maloney and Martin O’Neill. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

Instead, Martin O’Neill and Shaun Maloney turned up like two retro renegades, and somehow, somehow, built a team in a week that remembered what it means to play for this club.

In a game that felt like therapy, Celtic opened like a team reborn. They were sharp, they were direct and they were relentless. Johnny Kenny, may barely be old enough to remember O’Neill’s first spell, nodded in like Sutton used to, from an Arne Engels corner that could’ve come straight from Lubo’s playbook. 1–0, and Hampden, or half of it at least exhaled for the first time since kick off.

Johnny Kenny of Celtic scores his team’s first goal during the Premier Sports Cup Semi Final match between Celtic and Rangers at Hampden Park on November 02, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

That goal felt like a statement, like ‘we’re still here by the way.’

The rest of the first half was pure adrenaline. Celtic could have been three or four up. Butland was ridiculous in theRangers goal, it seemed everything that came near him, he got a hand, or something else, to it. For a player who’d end up being blamed for one of the goals later, he was the only reason the game wasn’t over before half-time.

theRangers go down to ten men after referee Nick Walsh shows the red card. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

Thelo Aasgaard of theRangers walks off the pitch after receiving a red card during the Premier Sports Cup Semi Final match between Celtic and theRangers at Hampden Park on November 02, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Then came the nonsense. Aasgaard, wild and idiotic, flattened Tony Ralston, a red card every day of the week. No debate. And surprise, surprise, almost on cue, the officials found a way to tilt the scales. Ralston penalised for a ‘handball’ that nobody believed was one, even with the benefit of replays galore. Penalty. Tavernier. 1–1.

Tavernier scores from theRangers penalty. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

The usual script. The usual rage.

And yet, this Celtic side didn’t fold. They wobbled, certainly, they looked tired, the old fragility tried to creep back in, but Schmeichel, who’s taken his share of stick of late, chose this day to remind us why his name still carries, well, weight. He saved Celtic, literally and symbolically, with a couple of point-blank miracles.

Then came extra time, the stage of a game where fatigue and fate start to debate the conclusion, and that’s when Callum McGregor decided to take the whole story and rewrite it himself.

Callum McGregor celebrates. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

A touch, a look, and a hit that defied belief, the kind of strike that carries intention in its flight, a ball that moved so fast Butland barely blinked before it hit the net. Souttar flinched, Butland overcommitted, the crowd exploded, and for a few seconds, Hampden sounded like the roof might come off.

That was McGregor not just scoring a goal, that was him reclaiming the captaincy in spirit. After weeks of playing within himself under Rodgers, here was the old Callum again, leading by action, not platitude.

Callum Osmand scores. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

Then came the clincher, the purest, simplest football of the day. Tierney, galloping like he’d never left, whipped a perfect ball across the box, and Osmand, Kid Callum, was there to dive on it and finish like a veteran. 3–1.

And done. From acrimony to astonishing in less than a week. It felt not just like relief, although that was certainly felt too, but also something closer to renewal.

The last week had been painful, Rodgers’ resignation, the churn of staff, the noise from pundits and boardroom alike. But O’Neill – and Maloney – did what great coaches do, they made it about the players again, they made it simple, direct and emotional.

For all the talk of modern systems and data models, occasionally football is just about belief, about walking onto the pitch and remembering who you are. And make no mistake, this team remembered.

Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

Trusty and Scales were warriors. Engels looks like a proper footballer out there. Maeda was pure joy and chaos. Kenny and Osmand, the future, maybe. Schmeichel, magnificent, they all were.

Even the bookings, Trusty’s rash one, Maeda’s borderline one, spoke of something Celtic had perhaps lacked under Rodgers, an edge. You can control a football match without killing its spirit. O’Neill understood that. Always has.

Referee Nick Walsh. Celtic v theRangers. Premier Sports Cup, semi final at Hampden. 2 November 2025. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)

Let’s not sugarcoat it, the officiating was awful. That penalty decision was beyond parody, and the tolerance for theRangers’ rotational fouling was absurd. Nick Walsh looked like a man wanting to influence the outcome, his performance was maddening. But the most telling thing is, Celtic didn’t let it define them.

Two of the worst calls in the game btw, but not a peep in the media….
– lunedì 3 novembre 2025

In previous weeks, we might have folded, started pointing fingers, drifted out of things entirely. Not this time though. The players fought through it. You could almost see the dressing-room dynamic flipping back into something resembling unity.

It’s just one game, but it certainly feels bigger. A sliding doors moment. You can’t fake what we saw in those celebrations, the emotion, the exhaustion, the sheer catharsis of it all.

Martin O’Neill during the Premier Sports Cup Semi Final match between Celtic and Rangers at Hampden Park on November 02, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

At the final whistle, O’Neill smiled that wry old smile and quipped, “I was 73 on Monday, I’m 94 now.” You could feel every year of that joke. Because this wasn’t a tactical masterclass or a football clinic, it was more like a spiritual reboot.

For the first time in a long time, Celtic looked like a team again. Our team again.

If you’d told me a week ago that O’Neill would be in the dugout and Osmand would score the winner, I’d have checked your meds, directly with your GP.

But football’s funny like that. It doesn’t always ask for perfection, sometimes it just asks for belief.

And at Hampden, Celtic found theirs again. Here are the extended highlights…

Niall J

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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