The honours may have been shared but there was only one winner at Ibrox yesterday. That Celtic managed to salvage a draw from the eye of a thunderous Old Firm storm allowed the champions to escape back to the other side of the city with a nine-point lead at the top and their title defence intact.
And that was probably about as much as they could possibly have hoped for after being on the receiving end of a derby-day roughing-up at the home of their old neighbours. In fact, Celtic only turned up for about 20 minutes at the start of this one and in that time they did enough to take an early lead through Daizen Maeda.
This was to the considerable angst of a Rangers support that growled in disapproval all the way to the half-time break, even though long before then their own side was actually seizing control of the contest right in front of their eyes. Two goals at the start of the second half lifted the mood of the locals but just when it seemed Michael Beale was on the cusp of notching up a major victory, his players contrived to give it away two minutes from time.
