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Rangers look like they know where they want to go - Celtic just look lost - Published At the end, every fibre of Derek McInnes' being must have wanted to have one of those Steven Gerrard moments, a scream of delight and relief into a Celtic Park camera lens, a human reaction to a significant victory on hostile terrain. McInnes, though, showed little emotion. He shook hands with a now beleaguered Martin O'Neill and pretty much got out of there. Later, the first words he uttered on radio were about not going "overboard" after back-to-back wins against their city rivals. "Just three points." he said. "Three points closer to Celtic." That's true, of course, but it was also the first time a Rangers manager has won his first two games against Celtic since Graeme Souness in 1986. McInnes was 15 years old at the time. So there was historical context but also deep relevance in the here and now. Rangers were good, and clearly deserving of the win, but they didn't quite hit the levels of ruthlessness of a week ago at Ibrox. They can be better and yet they won as comfortably as it's possible to win when the margin at the end is just a single goal. Their superiority would have been better reflected had they won by two. O'Neill has problems mounting game-by-game O'Neill said there was "not much between the sides" but nobody was really buying that, Celtic folk chief among them. The Celtic manager has problems and they're mounting game-by-game. His team is physically weak and mentally substandard. They have lost the elan they had in a few games in early season. They were out-played, out-muscled and out-coached. Again. O'Neill has time to pause now, time to reassess. Time, perhaps, to question whether he's got the answers to the myriad ills of his team. He doesn't have robust players in midfield because his board has not delivered them. He doesn't have the kind of wingers the club had when Daizen Maeda, Liel Abada, the still unfit Jota and Nicolas Kuhn were knocking around. In Yang Hyun-jun's absence - and week on week he appears to be spoken about as an absent world beater - James Forrest is the best winger they have. So says former captain Scott Brown, who knows Celtic players. Forrest is 35-years-old. Neither does O'Neill, at present, have good instincts. Starting Sebastian Tounekti at Ibrox last week was an odd call and he changed it at half-time. Going with Sam Johnstone in goal at Rangers back-fired. Giving Luke McCowan his first start of the season on Sunday was another curious decision that didn't work. The midfielder was off the pace and never came out for the second half. O'Neill's famed ability to problem-solve and inspire has deserted him, for now. When set against the newfound organisation and vigour of this Rangers set-up then Celtic look jaded. Their supporters are being cast into a scenario that none of them want to be a part of - wondering aloud, or just quietly, if the icon still has it in him. He sounds like he does. If that is the case then he needs more from his assistants - or just better ones. From board level to coaching and playing, the whole operation looks humdrum and in need of a mighty shake. It's as if the 5-1 Champions League disintegration against LASK has removed not just confidence but heart and soul. There was little gumption at Ibrox in the 3-0 League Cup loss, there was only a brief early reaction against Ferencvaros in the Europa League before another beating, and now there's a third poor loss in a row and a fourth inside a month. McInnes has really hit upon something How quickly things turn. A few short weeks ago, as Rangers exited Europe to the sound of booing, McInnes didn't hold back when assessing the problems in his team. Not a possession team, not a pressing team, not a counter-attacking team, he said. They were also too young and too inexperienced, a collection of individuals but not a unit - no identity, no discernible style of play. What were weaknesses then are, in the blink of an eye, strengths now. Callowness has become youthful excellence. For the second straight week, Olwethu Makhanya was the most dominant and classy defender on the pitch. He's 22. For the second straight week the hardest-working and most effective attacking player was Ryan Naderi. He's 23. Dan Neil and Nico Raskin, aged 24 and 25, were once again hugely influential in the middle of the park. Neil looked fairly ordinary not that long ago. Now he's growing fast as Rangers captain. The oldest Rangers player from the start was James Penrice, who is 27. Celtic had six guys who were older than him in their team. The average age of the line-ups was 26.7 versus 24.4. McInnes has moulded them all into a group of players who have, against Celtic, shown maturity and togetherness. He has really hit on something. Certain things stood out. At half-time, Rangers were not just ahead thanks to Naderi's goal, they were winning battles all over the pitch, just as they had done last Sunday. They were winning aerial duels by 67.6% to 32.4%, they had eight shots to Celtic's one, six on target to Celtic's zero. Camilo Duran had eight touches of the ball, Kevin Kelsy had 13 and Naderi 23. All the individual match-ups were more or less Rangers victories. Even when Celtic's club record-signing Kasper Hogh came on, not a lot changed. Rangers had more chances in the second half. Hogh got no service again, but he's beginning to look like a player so devoid of belief that even if service did come his way there's no guarantee that he'd execute the way he did so often for Bodo-Glimt. When your star striker can't get a start and when your leader, Callum McGregor, is getting over-run, then you have problems, too many for O'Neill to solve. McInnes was right about the three points thing, but the momentum in Glasgow is his now. The energy, the clarity, the optimism is blue and not green. The power has switched with breakneck speed and, of course, it could switch back again if Celtic get their act together. There are massive questions now, though. More than O'Neill would have ever faced in the city before. Rangers look, at the moment, like a club that knows where it wants to go. Celtic, by contrast, look lost in a haze of confusion and uncertainty.
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