THE best line of the weekend came from Kris Boyd when he was asked for his thoughts on Rangers drawing Celtic.
Quick as a flash: "A weekend off for me."
That is a very good joke at his own expense, if you know your history. Boyd was famously the man who was usually overlooked when it came to Old Firm games in his first spell at Rangers. He would go rampaging through Premier League defences, and gluttonously help himself to goals against lower-league fodder in the cups, only to find his backside parked on the subs' bench when Walter Smith was picking his Rangers team for games in Europe or against Celtic. Boyd has scored against Celtic, but Smith rarely started him against them and rarely allowed him the full 90 minutes.
He can joke about it now because unless he is injured or suspended there is no doubt he will be pitched in against Celtic this time. This has been a sluggish season for him so far but the winner he dug out against Dumbarton was his eighth goal in 18 appearances this term. Rangers were mediocre, to put it kindly, and if they play against Celtic like they did at the Bet Butler Stadium they are in for one hell of a going over. But it would be an insult to our intelligence to start speculating too profoundly about the clubs' state of play for a match which is 13 weeks away (and, boy, this will feel like a long 13 weeks). Suffice to say that Rangers have plenty of time to improve, and will need to work every day of it.
Facing Celtic and the legitimate fear of being outclassed might sharpen the players' attitude and professionalism at Rangers. Their season is actually ticking along very nicely - in the semi-finals of the League Cup, in today's draw for the Scottish Cup fourth round, second in the SPFL Championship - but too many performances have featured the carelessness and poor quality evident under Dumbarton's rock.
To give themselves a chance against Celtic their passing and crossing will have to dramatically improve, their conversion of chances will have to be better and they will have to be tighter and more authoritative at the back. Scott Brown and Stefan Johansen will run over the top of Nicky Law and Ian Black on the current evidence.
Even Lewis Macleod, the much-praised gem of the current side, was relatively ineffective on Saturday and did not do enough with the ball, although his one lovely pass of the afternoon put Boyd through in first-half stoppage time for the only goal. The team's lack of pace seems an irreparable flaw ahead of the derby.
Their heads are full of Celtic and Old Firm talk, yet Rangers face Cowdenbeath at Central Park tomorrow night in precisely the sort of fixture people would currently expect the league leaders, Hearts, to win. It is on November nights in Fife that league-winning campaigns are built. That Rangers cannot allow the Celtic game to distract them was a point Boyd returned to again and again when he was pressed about the semi-final draw.
"The semi-final is a long way away and we need to concentrate on our league challenge and the Scottish Cup now that we're in the next round. We know that if we play at our best then we can give anyone in Scotland a game. But for us the main focus is showing our league form of the last couple of months. There is also another round or two in the Scottish Cup, that's important for us, then we can look forward to the Celtic game. It will be massive but I can't emphasise enough how much our focus needs to be getting back into the top flight. I don't think it will become a distraction because we've said from day one the league is most important.
"The draw is great. The whole of Scottish football needs this fixture. It's a great opportunity for the two biggest clubs in the country to go head to head again. It's a chance for us to show that Scottish football isn't dead. We're still massive clubs worldwide and want to go and put on a performance but we know that we need to be at our best if we're to have any chance of beating them.
"We want four, five, six Old Firm games a season and that will only happen once Rangers get back to the top and if you draw each other in the cups. People will write us off but we're confident going into any game with the players we've got. As soon as you pull on that blue jersey you never accept defeat so the pressure is also on us despite being underdogs."
The rain came on towards the end of the afternoon at the Bet Butler. A cold, November teatime in Dumbarton, the ground's only stand quickly emptied of fans … it was briefly hard to believe Rangers could be experiencing this while contemplating a future match that Ally McCoist claimed could fill the Maracana. Thinking, preparing for and being asked about Celtic is going to be an almighty drain on McCoist and his players' energy over the coming three months and it is up to them to handle that. Rangers have a massive game coming up all right, and it's Hearts at Tynecastle on November 22.
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