Jack Butland puts foot in mouth again as Rangers goalie denies obvious Celtic gap

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Celtic don’t need any extra motivation to bounce back from their Rangers defeat.

However, if they ever did need words pinned to the dressing room wall, Jack Butland can always be counted on.

The Rangers goalkeeper dug a hole for himself after Celtic won the Premier Sports Cup back in December and now he has put his foot in his mouth for a second time when asked about the gap between Glasgow’s big two.

The Premiership table tells its own story with 13 points separating the two in a one-sided title ‘race’ again this season.

Position	Team	Played MP	Won W	Drawn D	Lost L	For GF	Against GA	Diff GD	Points Pts
1	CelticCeltic	30	24	3	3	89	20	69	75
2	RangersRangers	30	19	5	6	62	28	34	62
3	HibernianHibernian	30	11	11	8	45	41	4	44
4	AberdeenAberdeen	30	12	7	11	38	46	-8	43

And yet, Butland continues to paint the picture of Celtic and Rangers being closely matched because the Ibrox team won one game at Parkhead.

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Jack Butland claims there is no big gap between Celtic and Rangers

Asked if the gap is as big as people think, Butland at least acknowledged that Gers have to work on themselves before catching the Hoops.

He said: “No, it’s going to take a bit. We need to work, we need to improve, we need to improve on some of the things that we spoke about. So I’m sure there will be things discussed.

“I’m sure a lot of it has been the belief side, I guess a lot of it has been inconsistency of performance. We need to get that back. With all the things that have gone on this season, we haven’t been able to put together a real period of time of being dominant, being successful, winning games. We haven’t done enough this year.”

Butland does feel, though, that he and his teammates “don’t believe there’s a big gap” which is a questionable verdict at best.

Celtic have lost just three league matches this term while their rivals have been beaten six times. Where draws are concerned it’s three for Celts and five for the Light Blues.

When Celtic can officially win the Premiership title

Goal difference is also significantly in Celtic’s favour with 69 compared to 34. The league title is almost sewn up and Celtic know the date they can lift the trophy.

So when Butland says his piece, it’s hard to take it seriously.

“The last part of this season is very much about winning as many games as we can,” he added. “The target is obviously to win all of them including beating Celtic at home. We need to keep winning, we need to finish the season on a high.

“Whatever gap people want to put there, there are reasons why, go ahead, but we don’t believe that there is a big gap. As the league sits, there’s a gap that we need to close and we need to try to do that before the end of the season.”