Scottish Cup offers Rangers chance to defy expectations against Celtic

A Rangers season which began with typically lofty expectations could effectively end before May Day. Defeat by Celtic in Sunday’s Scottish Cup semi-final would extinguish the one lingering hope of silverware from a campaign during which Rangers have continued to wrestle with the frustration of being second best in a two-horse race.

Knockout football is such a fickle beast that some would rail at any assertion the winners of this Old Firm clash will lift the cup. Unfortunately the gulf between Celtic, Rangers and the rest of the top flight is stark enough without contemplating the prospects of second-tier Inverness and League One Falkirk, who meet in Saturday’s semi-final. Odds of at least 20-1 for either to win the trophy almost seem to underplay the situation.

A key talking point will and should surround the preposterous assertion of the Scottish Football Association that a crowd of considerably fewer than 20,000 should trot along to the 52,000-capacity Hampden Park on Saturday when the match would be far more sensibly hosted at Tynecastle or Easter Road. The Scottish Cup has no sponsor, the Scottish game very little positive image beyond its own parochial boundaries. Those in high office, who will look on silently from cosy seats as sectarian verse pollutes the Hampden air on Sunday, need to raise their game.

That this semi constitutes Rangers’ last stand will add to the sense of fervour from their end. A desire to do something, anything, to show Celtic can be bruised has lurched towards desperation. There has even been the rising and nonsensical suggestion Michael Beale, Rangers’ head coach, should come under pressure if he fails to seal a June return to Hampden. This notion resonates in the antiquated notion that