Celtic land double £70m Deal slapdown as Rangers burden made clear

Celtic have been blamed for the run in Europe that has seen Fiorentina emerge as the only side that can rescue Scotland’s top 10 coefficient spot.

It’s the Scots vs the Czech Republic for the final spot in the top 10 which guarantees a Champions League spot for the top flight winners up to 2025/26 – which Celtic have enjoyed for the last two campaigns after claiming the Scottish Premiership title. But Rangers’ defeat to Benfica on Thursday has put certainty over the group stage spot in major jeopardy with Scotland now unable to add any more points going forward.

With Viktoria Plzen reaching the Europa Conference League quarter-finals, any positive result for the Czechs against the Serie A outfit would see Scotland drop out of the 10 best performing nations in the UEFA rankings. And Record columnist Tam McManus was hovering over the panic button with Scotland’s spot for automatic qualification for Europe’s elite competition hanging by a thread.

McManus told PLZ: “It’s huge. Plzen got Fiorentina which is pretty good from our point of view. I think they are second favourites to win the competition so you would hope Fiorentina can beat them home and away and Plzen don’t get any coefficient points.

“So I think there would have been a lot of people wanting Rangers to get through that tie from a Scottish point of view, but unfortunately they didn’t. So hopefully Fiorentina turn Plzen over and we can just cling on to that 10th spot.”

Holding the top 10 spot will be key for both Celtic and Rangers with the £35million prize pot for reaching the group stage to be doubled from next season. And speaking on Clyde 1 Superscoreboard, Hugh Keevins didn’t hold back on Celtic.

He said: ‘We make a song and dance of our clubs getting into Europe but they are not terribly good when they get there. Celtic’s record in Europe is fairly awful. Rangers can say that they have done their bit. Giovanni van Bronckhorst took them to a European final. Clement, from a bad start, took them to the last 16.”