Celtic come back, Falkirk and Gretna break down, Rangers roll

By: Ian Rose | August 11th, 2007

The day’s SPL matches have just ended, and here’s what happened.

In the early game, Celtic went to Falkirk and got an early shock as Michael Higdon followed his brace last week with a 5th-minute goal to open the scoring. The disaster then started with an own-goal by Falkirk’s Kenny Milne, and it just got worse from there. You knew it wouldn’t be long before Shunsuke Nakamura got a trademark free kick goal, and he did so in 79th, just three minutes after Kenny Miller put in a nice little rebound, just the sort of ball I usually mock him for missing. Jan Vennegor of Hesselink made it a full drumming with one more goal to make it 4-1 Celtic.

Gretna led Hibernian 2-0 in the 50th minute, and looked to be on their way to making a statement against all the haters … then, like Falkirk, they just lost control. Hibs’ Merouane Zemmama scored two, and Kevin McCann and young Steven Fletcher added their own for a 4-2 win.

Rangers went to St. Mirren fully expecting a win over last season’s 11th place side, and they got it on the strength of Barry Ferguson’s third goal in two league matches and another from Daniel Cousin twelve minutes into his Rangers debut. Rangers won 2-0, and now have four wins in a row to start their season, with four straight clean sheets for keeper Allan McGregor.

Inverness Caley Thistle thought they had the win in the 82nd minute on a goal from Ross Tokely, but Motherwell responded just three minutes later with a goal from Phil O’Donnell. Then, to twist the knife in both Inverness’ heart and my own, Grant Munro was called for a 90th minute penalty, which Ross McCormack converted well. Motherwell took the match 2-1.

Rangers now sits at the top of the table with six points and a goal differential of +5. Hibs and Motherwell are also a perfect 6 points after 2 matches. Gretna sits in the bottom spot, two goals behind Inverness and three behind St. Mirren on differential.

Tomorrow, Aberdeen hosts Hearts, and I’ll be there. Pray for sunshine.