You’re Celtic United and Dembele has decided you’re best team Rod’s ever seen
Superfan rocker leads song and dance as Hoops run riot
Rod Stewart is used to leading crowds of 60,000 plus in a song and dance.
But yesterday he was happy to be the one jigging with the rest as Celtic led wretched Rangers a merry dance.
The Hoops superfan was in the directors’ box with owner Dermot Desmond and Peter Lawwell. It’s usually a bastion of polite restraint and self control – but not yesterday.
Not given their delight at spanking their greatest rivals after a four-year wait to see them back at Parkhead. It was too much for even the most well-heeled fatcat to resist.
By the time Moussa Dembele completed his hat- trick Rod was on his feet, dancing and jigging, as almost the entire stadium turned their backs on the pitch to do a mass huddle.
If dear old Roy Castle was still with us, he’d have put down his trumpet and started counting – this was surely a Guinness Book of Records’ contender for the biggest huddle ever.
And it was appropriate that the guy who famously wrote a song with the lyrics “Celtic United” should be at the heart of this col lective show of jubilation at a result that was well worth waiting for.
How long will Rangers have to wait until they can muster a team capable of mounting a serious challenge to the champions’ title credentials?
Well, on the evidence of this battering, it could be another few years in the making.
Two hours before kick-off, the Celtic Way was already bustling with hoop-clad fans. Waiting.
Sure, to give their heroes a warm reception – but let’s not kid ourselves here.
It was the other mob that most were gathering for.
Who could blame them? After all they’ve waited fourand-a-half years for this.
The chance to greet the Rangers bus on to their territory and make it abundantly clear this was a hostile land.
They didn’t disappoint as Mark Warburton and his players stepped out to a cacophony of boos and jeers.
Assistant boss David Weir smi led his way past the gauntlet – a starkly different demeanour to his glum face as he was sent to the stand a couple of hours later as Gers’ discipline unravelled.
Behind him Joey Barton kept
a stony poker face and a tunnel vision towards the temporary sanctuary of the front door. Welcome to the Old Firm. But this was a mere breeze compared to the storm ahead in the cavernous bowl at the other end of the tunnel.
Stepping out there must have felt like walking into a hurricane. A maelstrom of noise and colour.
In one corner was a huge human Irish tricolour as the Celtic fans crammed in that area pulled on bibs specially left on their seats for their arrival.
In the blue corner, huge flags filled the Rangers end, waving in defiance as they did their best to make themselves heard despite being outnumbered.
And to think some people still say Scottish football hasn’t missed this fixture.
Yes, you can wring your
Yes, you can wring you hands and point to the unsavoury elements but to say the bad outweighs the good is ludicrous
hands and point to the unsavoury elements of the Glasgow rivalry.
Was there a need for Celtic fans unfurling a huge banner referring to f lags of war? It’s a game of football for goodness sake.
And the audible singing from Rangers fans, suggesting all sorts of unmentionables in relation to the leader of the Catholic church, remains a problem.
There’s no place for it and it should be condemned and fought at every turn.
But to say the bad outweighs the good of Scotland’s biggest fixture – indeed one of the biggest games in Europe – is ludicrous.
For Niko Kranjcar, however, it was an experience that lasted only 45 minutes as one of Gers’ marquee summer signings flopped on the big stage. Before kick-off, eyebrows were raised at the omission of Andy Halliday – one of the few guys in the Ibrox dressing-room who understands what this game is all about.
A call that became even more questionable as the first half wore on with Kranjcar increasingly looking like a man losing the plot.
Inside the first 10 minutes he petulantly left a foot in on a challenge with Tom Rogic and was lucky it didn’t connect.
With play raging around him, the 31-year- old looked off the pace, leading him to lunge into repeated reckless tackles.
He’d been warned earlier by ref Willie Collum so it was no surprise when the Croat copped his 29th-minute booking for persistent fouling.
Still, the former Tottenham man pushed his luck further, going down clutching his face when he was clearly untouched in a challenge with Nir Bitton.
In all likelihood he would have been sent off had he not been hooked by his boss at t half-time.
Hal liday as his replacement was seemingly an admission that the manager had got it wrong.
Still, Kranjcar wasn’tsn’t the only Rangers player to be bfoundfd wanting. Barton failed to live up to his pre-season big talk.
Rob Kiernan was an absolute bombscare, gifting possession for Dembele’s second goal.
And Philippe Senderos looked sluggish and eventually utterly stupid as his deliberate handball earned him his marching orders.
Celtic in contrast were swift, swashbuckling and superior in movement and creativity.
Dembele was the star of the show by becoming the first Celtic player to score a hat-trick in an Old Firm league game since
Stev ie Chalmers in 1966. But there were outstanding per formances throughout Brendan Rodgers’ side.
Even Barton was big enough to recognise that, seeking out Scott Brown to shake hands with the guy he’d branded “not in his league” when he first arrived in Glasgow.
There’s no doubt who did the talking where it matters on the pitch. Now Celtic can head to Barcelona tomorrow with a lot more belief. It will be a different challenge in the Nou Camp but for now Rodgers and Rod can enjoy a moment that will live long in their heart and in their soul.