CRITICS HAD TO SHUT IT
return. But man-of-thematch Balogun reckons Rangers have silenced the doubters after besting Ange Postecoglu’s resurgent Hoops.
He said: “It’s amazing. There are a lot of people running their mouth when something negative happens around our club.
“It’s not even our fault because we all live in this pandemic.
“Whenever something like this happens, we have people coming after us.
“But we have shown in this match what awaits you if you do that.
“That’s the big family. It’s the first time I’ve met the fans in an Old Firm.
“It has been magnificent the way they have been pushing us.
“We had a tough week behind us, some setbacks within the group, but everybody just stuck together.
“People have been stepping up from the reserves, from everywhere.
“We have shown what that is about. It’s been amazing.”
With Tavernier and Nathan Patterson both quarantining, Balogun was forced to deputise at right-back.
The Nigeria star looked suspect when he was asked to step in to that role at times last term but he was a pillar of strength this time for Gerrard’s team as he put the shackles on new Parkhead favourite Kyogo Furuhashi.
“I think I did alright,” Balogun said. “My legs have been screaming the past 10 minutes but you have to step up sometimes.
“You know that there is not much we can do about the situation so you just have to step up and bring our best.
“I’m lucky that my best looked that way in this derby, even in an unusual position for me. It’s been amazing. I’m so out of breath but that old body can still move.
“You see after the final whistle what it means to everyone. It makes it that much sweeter.
“The atmosphere helped a lot in the final minutes. Seriously a lot. My body had been cramping up. You could see everybody was blowing a bit.
“It makes you just want to put in that work. You just want to sacrifice everything, leave everything out there, if you hear those fans.
“After the goal actually, I was running back, I looked at my arms and I was having goosebumps. It was outstanding after the final whistle as well. What can I say?”
Celtic blew a huge chance to take a first-half lead when Odsonne Edouard fluffed wide from five yards out and Postecoglou’s team were made to regret it when Helander thudded home a Borna Barisic corner in the 66th minute.
Balogun added: “I went to Fil and said ‘man of the match winner’ and he said, ‘no, you got it’.
“Whatever. But we deserved to score from open play. You have seen we are strong on setplays and how important these set-plays can be. I’m happy that we could exploit that.”