Celtic Go Top After Rangers Draw Away

Celtic 2 Hearts 1

After initially falling behind at home to Hearts on Sunday morning, Celtic staged a dramatic comeback to win the game 2-1 with a late winner and fire themselves to the top of the Scottish Premier League with Rangers drawing away to Kilmarnock.

Celtic were without captain Stephen McManus after he was dropped by manager Tony Mowbray, while Gary Caldwell returned to partner Glenn Loovens at the back, and Scott McDonald replaced Georgios Samaras, who missed the game through injury.

Hearts opened the scoring in the fifth minute after a 40-yard solo run left him in a position to fire the ball into the net from 18 yards out.

Celtic were not effected by the early goal though and applied pressure on the visitors, coming close to scoring several times in the first half.

The fans would have to wait until the 56th minute for the equalizer though, when Killen fired the ball towards goal.

Hearts' keeper Balogh stopped that shot but the rebounded ball was crossed back in by Maloney, and was met by the head of a diving Killen and diverted into the goal.

Both sides pressed for a winner in the last quarter-of-an-hour but the game looked destined for a draw after Loovens headed in a ball from the corner as time ran down.

On Thursday, Celtic got off to a poor start in their Europa League campaign when they lost 2-1 away to Hapoel Tel-Aviv.

Celtic had the lead after 25 minutes when Georgios Samaras fired a low ball past the keeper for the opener, but despite looking better than the home side in the first half, they let Tel-Aviv back into the game in the second.

A Namanja Vucicevic shot equalized the game and Maaran Lala scored the winner from close range in the 88th minute.

Celtic find themselves in 3rd place in their qualifying group after Rapid Vienna won their opener 3-0 against Hamburg SV.

After the match, manager Tony Mowbray expressed his opinion that the heat in the stadium had impacted the performance of his team: "The conditions were very demanding, covering that extra yard became more difficult.

"Our concentration levels in the last 15 minutes weren't as high as they had been, but let's not take anything away from our opponents.

"Hapoel are a good team, they played well and probably deserved the win."

The idea of the Old Firm moving south into the English Premier League will be brought up again at the next league meeting in November.

Led by Bolton chairman Phil Gartside, the plan under discussion would include Rangers and Celtic in two divisions of 18-teams.

UEFA has said that they wouldn't object to the idea but the plan would have to be approved by the Premier League, the Football Association, the Football League, the Scottish Premier League and the Scottish Football Association.