Celtic’s young guns have been hit with a title blow, after Rangers reserves’ convincing 4-1 win over Hamilton at the Hummel Training Centre yesterday.
The result means that Rangers overtake Celtic on goal difference in second place on 35 points. Hibernian still lead the pack with 35 too, but a point for either Celtic or Rangers on the final day would end their hopes. Hibs have already finished their campaign.
It means that the reserve league will go down to the wire. Celtic host St Johnstone on May 3rd, whilst Rangers take a tricky looking trip to Falkirk too three days afterward. That gives the young Hoops the chance to pile the pressure on Rangers.
But the commanding nature of their win over Accies is disappointing. The title looks likely to come down to goal difference, and Rangers have started racing away in that regard.
As it stands, Celtic will be ruing their 2-0 home loss to Rangers last week. It’s the result that hauled the Hummel Training Centre side back into proceedings, and could end up being a cruel lesson for the young guns.
A massive win over third-bottom St Johnstone is a necessity on next Friday. Anything less and Rangers look like strong favourites to take the reserve league title.
A productive season for the young guns
Regardless of what happens, of course, it’s been a positive season for the youngsters at Celtic. Many of the senior players such as Marvin Compper and Scott Allan haven’t featured in the run-in. This has allowed the youth talent at Parkhead to experience a title climax all by themselves.
Armstrong Oko-flex and Ewan Henderson have both been called up to the senior squad this term. But with the progress the likes of Kerr McInroy, Karamoko Dembele, and Daniel Church have made respectively, they could easily be seen next season.
There’s hardly the same expectation to win the reserve league as the first-team have with the Premiership. Rangers have plenty of fine young talent themselves, and both sides have done well in this season’s reserve league campaign.
The young Hoops can look at impressive victories over the likes of Ross County and Motherwell in recent weeks and be pleased with themselves. They’ve coped well with the pressure, even if they suffered a blip against Rangers last week.
Hopefully, there’s another twist in the reserve league tale yet. But if there isn’t, the Celtic youngsters can look back on a decent campaign with the second-string.
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