With Celtic asserting their dominance in the Scottish Premiership again this weekend, the Hoops have another two big fixtures to negotiate this week.
Celtic’s fixtures are coming thick and fast with the Champions League trip to Dinamo Zagreb another hurdle for the Bhoys to overcome.
The Croatian champions are struggling for form before the Celtic game and Brendan Rodgers will fancy his chances against Zagreb on Tuesday.
However, it was the League Cup final against Celtic that was on Kris Boyd’s mind this weekend as Rangers took on Ross County and it seems that the Sky Sports pundit is being realistic about his old club’s chances of pulling off a win.
Kris Boyd ‘not kidded’ over Rangers’ chances of beating Celtic in League Cup final
Boyd told Sky Sports, “I mean, let’s not be kidded that, you look at those fixtures, I think the European game will take care of itself.
“It’ll be interesting to see what happens next Sunday, Celtic go into that heavy favourites and you’ve got to say if Rangers have to go and beat Celtic a shock and that shouldn’t be the case.
“There has been a lot of money spent at Rangers, and I know fault, Philippe Clement goes on about a young squad, but it’s not really a young squad.
“There might be a few youngsters in there, but it’s an experienced squad that’s been over the course and distance and knows exactly what it takes to win games of football at this level and they’re gonna have to get back to that and start doing it on a regular basis.
Rangers need to dig deep to beat a ‘flying’ Celtic team in League Cup final
After Rangers beat Ross County 3-0 in Dingwall, that still wasn’t enough to allow Boyd to get carried away as he fired this Celtic warning to Rangers.
Boyd continued, “It’s a big improvement, but it’s only gonna get tougher for the challenge ahead.
“Now you’re now looking at a Tottenham team that you don’t know what one’s gonna turn up and then you’re going into a cup final, which, Rangers are obviously the holders, Celtic are flying.
“It’s got the makings of a good cup final. But I still think Rangers will need to find a few gears if they’re going to challenge Celtic.
Because you look, they make changes, it doesn’t seem to bother them. Celtic have got an away trip on Tuesday night to come back and deal with that.
“But it has got the makings of a really good cup final and one that I’m sure that everybody will be looking forward to.
“But, exactly what happens, especially from a Rangers point of view because of the negativity that’s been flying around, yes, you’ve been able to build up a little bit of positivity but if all that goes out the window next weekend, then it’s back to the drawing board for Philippe Clement.”
With the first piece of silverware up for grabs for both Celtic and Rangers it’s fair to suggest that there is a lot more pressure on the Ibrox club heading into this game than there is on Brendan Rodgers.
If Celtic win, then realistically all that’s for Rangers to really play for is the Scottish Cup. That then piles more pressure on Clement as he will then be charged with trying to stop Celtic from winning a treble if Rodgers can keep this momentum going until the end of the season.
