Rangers v Celtic: Scottish Premiership - live

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63 min Röhl makes a tactical reshuffle, bringing on Mohamed Diomande for Naderi.

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Simon McMahon is back among the emails. “All Hearts, and indeed Motherwell, fans will no doubt be urging Celtic on to an equaliser.”

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Updated at 08.21 EST

61 min Celtic get forward and nab another corner. Tierney gets a good ball into the box, but Skov Olsen clears. Tounekti recycles the ball and picks out the onrushing Maeda in the box, but he heads straight at Butland. A great chance for an equaliser.

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60 min A shaky spell of passing at the back ends with Sinisalo hoofing a clearance out of play. Celtic can’t afford any more daft mistakes.

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57 min Chermiti gets in behind on the right but smashes a cross out of play, drawing a moan from the stands.

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GOAL! Rangers 2-1 Celtic (Tierney 56)

It’s back on! Celtic’s pressure pays off, a lovely passing move ending with Nygren picking out Tierney who nods past Butland to half the deficit.

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Updated at 08.21 EST

54 min Celtic get their first shot on target, Hatate lining one up from distance only for Butland to get down and push wide.

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52 min McGregor attempts an ambitious pass in behind, but it’s beyond the reach of Maeda.

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51 min Celtic earn a corner and Tierney takes it. A mass of blue shirts bars the way and the ball is flicked clear.

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50 min Araujo sends in a dangerous ball from the right, but nobody gets on the end of it. It’s better from the visitors.

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49 min Celtic apply a bit of pressure, but struggle to work an opening. Araujo picks out Nygren just outside the area, but he turns on his heel and lashes a shot well over.

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47 min Skov Olsen finds Moore, who whips a cross to the far post. Rommens gets to the ball but can only scuff straight to Sinisalo.

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46 min Raskin crosses to Chermiti, who squares for Skov Olsen. His shot is blocked for a corner, which comes to nothing.

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Second half kicks off!

We’re back under way at Ibrox and Celtic are immediately in trouble, Murray clearing with difficulty after the hosts pour forwards.

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Two half-time changes for Celtic, Oxlade-Chamberlain and Adamu hooked for Reo Hatate and Sebastian Tounekti.

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Want some half-time reading? Here’s a selection.

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Any thoughts on that half? That are actually publishable? Get in touch.

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Half-time, Rangers 2-0 Celtic

That was a rough half for the visitors, who made little of note going forward and were all over the place at the back. Moore ran the show in midfield, Chermiti combined the magical with the mundane for two very different goals, and Rangers have a solid advantage at the break. Celtic have a mountain to climb.

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Updated at 07.59 EST

43 min Another free-kick for Rangers, this time taken by Skov Olsen. Naderi heads it back across the box from the left and it falls for John Souttar, but his shot is blocked.

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40 min Skov Olsen wins a free-kick from Tierney in a dangerous area to the right of the box. Moore picks out Emmanuel Fernandez in a perfect position, but he glances his header wide.

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38 min Celtic put together a nice passing move, but Moore tackles Oxlade-Chamberlain on the edge of the area and looks to break. McGregor, who has been a yard behind him all half, brings him down for the first yellow card of the game.

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36 min Rommens brings down Yang in a similar position up the other end of the field. Oxlade-Chamberlain curls a delivery to the far post where Maeda is waiting, but he can’t land a clean header and Butland collects.

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35 min Rangers win a free kick out wide on the left flank. Moore whips the ball straight to Sinisalo.

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34 min Ryan Naderi almost reaches a loose ball in Celtic’s area, but can’t quite stretch far enough to poke it goalwards.

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33 min Scales cedes a corner after cutting out a dangerous ball into the box. Tierney clears with a thumping header at the near post.

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30 min Half an hour gone and Celtic haven’t had a shot. Moore marauds forward again but is tackled at the last.

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Updated at 07.33 EST

29 min Junior Adamu is down after being bulldozed in an aerial duel. Luckily it looks like he’ll be OK to continue.

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GOAL! Rangers 2-0 Celtic (Chermiti 26)

That is horrible, horrible defending from Celtic, but a great poacher’s goal from Chermiti. A garden-variety ball in behind from Raskin isn’t cleared by Murray and falls to the Rangers forward, who whisks the ball away from Araujo before sending a shot trickling under the stranded Sinisalo.

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Updated at 08.01 EST

… and again from Joshua Keeling, on the same theme. “Are Motherwell quietly in this title race as well? Big outsiders, obviously, but only just realised the are only a point behind Celtic.”

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More correspondence, this time from Simon McMahon. “Afternoon Will. Motherwell aren’t out of this either. They’re 10 points behind Hearts but have a game in hand. Maybe a long shot, but the fact we’re even talking about it, shows what a strange season this has been in Scotland. It’s like 1982-83, or indeed 1985-86, all over again. Without Dundee United and Aberdeen of course. But you get my point. At least Hearts won’t have to go to Dens on the last day.”

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Updated at 07.25 EST

22 min Chermiti feeds Moore in the box, but Liam Scales rushes across to clear.

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21 min Tierney whips in an excellent cross from the left, but Jack Butland, the Rangers keeper, rushes off his line to snuff out the danger.

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19 min Moore dribbles round McGregor and bursts into the box, but is stopped by Araujo before he can unleash a shot.

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17 min Celtic get the ball down and play, Benjamin Nygren drifting out left and winning a corner. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain steps up and whips in a decent delivery, which is just about cleared.

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15 min Yang gets forward and slips in Daizen Maeda, but his first touch is poor and his attempted cutback is intercepted and cleared.

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13 min Kieran Tierney lofts a cross-field ball to Yang Hyun-jun, but Tuur Rommens wins the battle for possession. Celtic are struggling to put together a passing move at the moment.

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12 min Moore wins a corner with more nice footwork. He takes it, but can only direct it on to the roof of the net.

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10 min Celtic win a couple of corners. The first is cleared, while the second ends with a Rangers counter-attack that almost results in a goal after Moore, showing beautiful footwork, gets in behind and stands the ball up at the far post. Chermiti can’t quite stretch far enough.

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GOAL! Rangers 1-0 Celtic (Chermiti 8)

What a finish. Rangers stroke the ball around the box before Andreas Skov Olsen scoops in an inviting cross. Youssef Chermiti smashes it into the back of the net with a spectacular overhead kick. Not a bad way to take the lead.

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Updated at 08.20 EST

7 min Moore is flattened by a thunderous shoulder-charge from Julián Araujo. He gets a talking to.

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6 min There’s chaos in the box at a Rangers corner, but the flag goes up for offside before anyone can get a decisive touch.

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5 min Dane Murray gets a crucial block in after a whipped shot from Moore. It’s been a frantic start.

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3 min Mikey Moore whips in a dangerous low cross from the left flank, but Callum McGregor reads it and intercepts smartly.

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1 min Nicolas Raskin lofts a pass from left to right, finding Tochi Chukwuani in an acre of space. His first touch lets him down, however, and the angle narrows, his cross-shot landing safely in the gloves of Sinisalo.

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Kick-off!

We’re under way at Ibrox amid a deafening roar, Rangers getting us started.

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The teams are in the tunnel. We’re about to get up and running.

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We’ve got our first bit of email correspondence (keep it nice please). “As a neutral, I basically want this game to produce whatever result is best for Hearts,” says Joshua Keeling. “I’m really rooting for them to pull this off.”

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O’Neill has also had his say to Celtic TV. Asked how he’s feeling before the game, he says: “My normal [feeling]. I’m excited, obviously nervously excited, about the game, hoping that we do well in the match, and to a certain extent looking forward to it.

“We’ll have to show all the same characteristics [as we did in the second leg against Stuttgart], plenty of resilience, plenty of determination, all of those particular things which are really important in any football game, but particularly here at Ibrox.”

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Röhl has been chatting away on Rangers TV before the match. “We’re looking forward for this game, it will be an exciting game,” he said. “We want to perform well, we want to show our fans a good game and, of course, we try everything to win this game. It would be a fantastic afternoon for us, and for this we prepared the whole week.

“I expect that at first the game will be very even. There will be a lot of duels, it could be that also sometimes there’s no rhythm in the game. All those things are what I expect. But I want to see a good team who is organised from our side, looking forward, attacking forward. [We must] have some good actions because it’s important that we win the crowd straight behind us in moments to create a good atmosphere.”

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Team news

For reference, Schmeichel has not returned to the Celtic lineup. Here are the teams:

Rangers: Butland, Sterling, Souttar, Fernandez, Rommens, Chukwuani, Raskin, Skov Olsen, Moore, Chermiti, Naderi

Celtic: Sinisalo, Araujo, Murray, Scales, Tierney, McGregor, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Nygren, Yang, Maeda, Adamu

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Updated at 06.28 EST

Unsurprisingly, there has been some needle in the buildup to this match. After Röhl said it would be “interesting” to see whether Kasper Schmeichel would return to the Celtic lineup after a strong performance from Viljami Sinisalo against Stuttgart in midweek, Martin O’Neill was not best pleased. “So he is picking our team? Well done old Danny. He’s only in less than a year,” said the Celtic manager. “I have to laugh. He’s made a comment about the picking of our team? Absolutely extraordinary. He hasn’t been in Glasgow long. There’s no need for him commenting on my team.”

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Plus, Barney Ronay on this season’s three-way Scottish title race. “For once this is not a title decider. It could be a title eliminator. It could be a step towards neither of Celtic or Rangers winning the league for the first time in 41 years. A draw in Glasgow could leave Hearts six points clear at the top. But by now it is a startling transformation whatever the outcome.”

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Updated at 06.21 EST

If you’re looking for some pre-match reading, here’s our match report from Hearts’ win against Aberdeen, with Sir Alex Ferguson in attendance, and Ewan Murray’s preview on this game.

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Preamble

It could be a seismic day for the Scottish title race, this. When Rangers host Celtic in a derby at the sharp end of the season, it’s usually a given that one or the other is top of the table. Instead, with Hearts edging out Aberdeen yesterday, second-place Rangers are now seven points off the summit, with Celtic nine points off the pace in third. Danny Röhl’s side have a game in hand on Hearts and Celtic have two but, regardless, they are running out of chances to haul in the table toppers. Victory today could make all the difference. It doesn’t get much bigger than this.

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