Celtic secured the first piece of silverware of the Scottish campaign with a win on penalties in the League Cup final at Hampden Park on Sunday.
The Hoops won 5-4 on penalties against their Glasgow rivals after an entertaining, for the neutral, 3-3 draw in regulation time, to win the competition for the first time since Brendan Rodgers returned to the club last summer.
They were twice pegged back by Rangers after going 2-1 and 3-2 up but kept their cool and ended up being perfect from the spot, scoring all five penalties.
The Gers won the competition, beating Aberdeen 1-0 in the final, last year after the Bhoys had been knocked out by Kilmarnock, and they were unable to defend their crown.
It was far from a perfect showing from the Scottish Premiership champions, given that they conceded three times and had to take the match to penalties.
However, there were a number of strong performers on the park for Celtic in the match, as a few of Rodgers’ star players stepped it up on the big stage.
Celtic’s top performers against Rangers
Despite letting in three goals, veteran goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel was fantastic between the sticks for the Scottish giants with several important stops, and could do little about the goals that were conceded.
The Denmark international, of course, had the telling moment in the match with his brilliant low save from Ridvan Yilmaz’s penalty to provide Daizen Maeda with the opportunity to win the game in the shoot-out.
Summer signing Arne Engels came off the bench to contribute to the victory with an assist for the third goal for Celtic, cutting the ball back to Nicolas Kuhn for the forward to score, before coolly converting from the spot in the penalties.
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