Hollywood actor Christoph Schulz was in attendance as Rangers were swatted aside at Celtic Park.
Only we’re sure the Oscar-winning actor didn’t think he’d see such a stunning performance in blue as 11 men perfectly impersonated a Rangers team.
Rangers huffed and puffed in the opening stages but the moment the ball hit the back of Jack Butland’s net, even though the goal was ruled out, Philippe Clement’s best XI froze on the big stage.
The scale of Rangers’ disastrous trip to Celtic Park will be poured over relentlessly this week as an apathetic Ibrox support shrug their shoulders.
Our rivals too – in an at times bored Celtic Park – are also getting a little tired of the utterly pathetic challenge which is being routinely mustered from Glasgow’s southside.
It was better with away fans, and my God, it was better when we had a team capable of giving them a game.
There are some who claim this match came too soon for Rangers’ new look squad, others will have a more doomsday-like outlook.
But as Rangers cut their wage bill, Philippe Clement fails to win in a fifth straight derby, and Celtic gloat as only we wish we could, a harsh reality is setting into Ibrox.
We can try to kid ourselves on, but as Celtic produce a Hollywood performance without barely breaking a sweat, Rangers’ best wouldn’t look out of place at panto time in the King’s Theatre.
Rangers losing apathetic support with every Old Firm
Heading into the match Philippe Clement was eager to temper expectations.
Rangers are at the beginning of their cycle the manager said, Celtic are fully into their groove.
Despite losing influential players Celtic have barely missed a beat and as Rangers struggle to glue together the shattered pieces of the most underwhelming summer in a generation, our rivals stretch out yet further in front.
Since the halcyon days of Steven Gerrard – Giovanni van Bronckhorst aside – there’s not a soul in the building who can attest to having delivered something we can be properly proud of.
Rangers might’ve started brightly – and had their openings – but a distinct lack of quality, belief and composure shines badly on a team, management and boardroom who look increasingly out of their depth by the match.
It is no exaggeration that – despite the money spent on wages and in the transfer market – we will be lucky to finish ahead of Aberdeen this season.
We’re being told that our expectations of a title challenge are too much for the second best-financed team in the league.
Paradoxically, we’re being deluded into thinking that at some level, we can catch a Celtic who are so much more fluently run in every department.
The truth is that Rangers are so far behind our rivals that had we presented anything like a challenge Celtic might’ve stepped up the two or three gears they clearly had to go through and match it.
Clement wants us to stay with this team. If they can’t lay a glove on our rivals, such good grace will be in short supply.
A title challenge is the bare minimum Rangers fans expect. Anything but a competitive side in the face of Celtic will quickly lose the belief of fans.
This was a disastrous day for a new Rangers team trying to build confidence and anything but a victory over Dundee United at Tannadice will see fans chuck in the towel, and head for the exits, before we’re even out of September.
The pressure of the title challenge of this campaign and that daunting Europa League group have us set up for amongst the most rocky six months in recent memory.
And we’ve had plenty.
Hampden has been half empty as Rangers rebuild Ibrox. We are worried for how soulless our home might look by the time we actually get the keys back.
Philippe Clement under mounting Celtic pressure
Rangers will lick their wounds, as we’re well used to as a support.
Maybe there are some in this team who will leverage that disastrous 90 minutes to their advantage and have the bit between their teeth when we meet them again in January.
But will there be XI? It’s hard to see and even harder to believe.
The Rangers team is so devoid of belief and confidence in this fixture that you also have got to look at the management of Philippe Clement.
Football is about more than money – but by God it helps – and it is clear that Philippe Clement struggles to get his team to believe in themselves v Celtic.
Often too literal, there’s a sinking feeling that Clement’s at times quite indulgent respect for Celtic is not in anyway reciprocated at Parkhead, and as a result, we’re sitting ducks with every passing Old Firm.
There is a resentment for Rangers at every level of Parkhead. From the stands, to the pitch, to the boardroom.
Such fervent determination to stand on the necks of one’s rivals at every opportunity is sorely missing at Ibrox.
It has been since we, quite miraculously in retrospect, lifted 55 in 2021.
We’re soft, we’re timid and moreover we are unbefitting of the support which has been through this meat grinder again and again over the last 10 to 15 years.
It’s hard to see anything but a transitional season at Ibrox and with Clement having been handed a new contract, he’ll get this season and (some of) the next.
Will it be enough to halt a Celtic who are better run in every department? Clement will probably try and tell us in a roundabout way that we’re fools for expecting it.
But having overseen the overhaul, what happens from here will rest squarely on the shoulders of one man.
It wasn’t just him he says, but he’ll bear the brunt of it.
Call it apathy, call it disappointment, but Clement is yet to prove himself in the face of Celtic and as level-headed as he appears come full-time, he is firmly in the spotlight.
The sting of this latest Celtic Park humbling will wear off amid the haze of commiserations and the upcoming international break.
But the lingering feeling is that – this season at least – the worst is very much still to come.
