There was drama after the final whistle at Ibrox after Celtic came from two goals down to draw 2-2 with Old Firm rivals Rangers on Sunday. Tempers flared over at the end of the game with shoving matches between both sets of players. Mikey Moore pushed Julian Araujo and angrily pointed his finger at the Mexican while Nicolas Raskin and Liam Scales clashed. Tuur Rommens and Tomas Cvancara also clashed in front of the cameras before Celtic manager Martin O’Neill – on the day of his 74th birthday – rushed in towards the centre circle to calm things down and separate the players.

O’Neill dragged Cvancara, Dane Murray and goalscorer Reo Hatate away by their shoulders as Celtic legend Chris Sutton joked on Sky Sports commentary: “He shouldn’t be doing that at his age!” The Northern Irishman could be heard shouting “get away, get away!” at his players before they headed over to the away end to thank their fans.

Rangers led 2-0 at half-time courtesy of Youssef Chermiti’s brace, which included an incredible overhead kick just eight minutes in. But Kieran Tierney halved the deficit before the hour mark and Hatate scored a fortuitous 91st-minute second rebound after seeing his penalty kick, and the first follow-up, both saved by Jack Butland.

That saved a point for the defending champions but it is still a poor result for both teams’ title aspirations. The draw leaves Hearts six points clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership table, with Rangers second and Celtic two points behind the Gers in third but with an extra game to play.

Celtic captain Callum McGregor told Sky Sports: “It’s high stakes, so everybody knows what’s on the line. It’s livelihoods and people that love the club. Of course there’s emotion in the games and sometimes it can boil over. It’s fine, you’ve just got to stay calm and stay disciplined and try and keep everybody calm. It’s an emotional title race.

“There’s three teams going for it, four teams if you bring Motherwell in as well. You’re going to need discipline and everyone. It’s about staying calm and executing what we know has got us success in the past. It’s trying to feed into that as much as possible.”

On the Hoops’ comeback, McGregor added: “Sometimes you have to take your medicine and regroup. That’s exactly what we did at half-time and we were by far the better team in the second half and probably unlucky not to go and win it.

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“There’s a long way to go. We spoke before the game that a point is a good result. It keeps it in our hands. We just have to keep winning our games. Overall, a game of two halves, but happy with the second-half performance.”

O’Neill reflected: “Today’s result is a really good result for Hearts, as much as anything else. If you’re involved with Hearts, you’re thinking, ‘a point each here would be good.’ We’ve been fighting the whole way through.

“It seems like it’s a proverbial mountain to climb every single week and games are getting fewer and fewer. But we’re still well in this here. We need to go and try and win on Wednesday. If we can do that, it’d be great, that will not be easy for us.”

Rangers boss Danny Rohl reacted: “When you lead 2-0, you’re very disappointed to end with a draw. 2-0 is always a difficult one. We’re really disappointed today. Next week we go again. Of course, lucky for them to get a penalty so late.

“I think it’s now six points. But still nine games to go which means 27 points [to play for]. I certainly believe it will go to the end. We take the point, we tried to take the three but we couldn’t. There’s no doubt, we won’t give up, it’s about the next game and there’s still a long way to go for all the teams.”

There are nine games remaining in the Premiership season, with Celtic travelling to struggling Aberdeen in midweek. Victory at Pittodrie would see them overtake Rangers and trim the gap at the top to five points. The Gers, by contrast, have a week without a game before hosting their Old Firm rivals in the Scottish Cup quarter-finals next Sunday (1pm).

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