Celtic and Rangers are to renew their rivalry after a gap of more than a year when they meet next month in the semi-finals of the William Hill Scottish Cup. The intriguing encounter, their 401st clash, has arisen after the sides were paired together in yesterday’s draw. Inverness Caledonian Thistle, the holders, or Hibernian will play Dundee United in the other tie.
The Old Firm were drawn together last year at the same stage in the League Cup but the circumstances appear to be very different now compared to last season’s mismatch when Celtic cruised to a 2-0 victory with Rangers unable to manage a single shot on target.
Fast forward over 14 months and it will be a transformed Rangers who face Ronny Deila’s defending champions at the national stadium on the weekend of April 16-17. Bookmakers make Celtic strong favourites for the tie, but form suggests a more evenly matched affair.
For Rangers, winning the Ladbrokes Championship is now a formality and at the weekend they crushed Dundee 4-0 in the quarter-finals with their best display under Mark Warburton.
In contrast, Celtic’s routine 3-0 victory over Morton yesterday won’t have done much to ease the mounting pressure on their Norwegian manager, for whom only a league title success and a Scottish Cup triumph — defeating Rangers on the way — is likely to afford him the chance to save his job. Rangers’ surge of belief was articulated by Kenny Miller, the veteran Ibrox striker and former Celtic player, after the draw — which was free of any malfunction this time — live on television.
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“We don’t fear anyone,” he said. “Whoever we drew was just going to be standing in the way of our goal which is to win the Scottish Cup, and I’ve said all along we have to get past Celtic if we want to win it.
“It will be a tough game, but I am fully confident if we go about the job in the way we know we can that we can get the right result. The manager has got us playing and believing, and that will never change no matter who we play.”
Rangers will have the advantage of playing at Hampden the previous weekend, too, when they entertain Peterhead in the Petrofac Training Cup final. It is a competition that has proved to be an embarrassment to Rangers in the past, but may yet have its uses.
Miller added: “It’s a huge week for the club. As much as the Petrofac is maybe not the most glamorous cup to win, it’s an opportunity to get this team its first bit of silverware and there would be no better way to go into an Old Firm game than off the back of winning a final.”
Hibernian and Caley Thistle must try again in the Highlands a week on Wednesday after the sides yesterday drew 1-1 at Easter Road where Andrea Mbuyi-Mutombo, the visitors’ substitute, equalised James Keatings’ opening goal.