One-nil at Aberdeen. Two-one at Falkirk. One-nil over Motherwell. One-nil over St Mirren. One-nil at Celtic Park. That is the whole of the last five league games in a handful of lines, and it is why Rangers sit second with sixteen points from seven and five straight wins behind them.
This is turning into a season of narrow margins held together by nerve. Eight scored in seven league games, four conceded, and only two of the seven matches have produced more than two goals. Nobody here is winning in threes and fours. They are winning by being the team that scored.
It emphatically did not begin like this. On the thirty-first of July it was one-one at Dundee United, the match played away and the score level. On the ninth of August, Hibernian turned up and won two-one — a home defeat, the only afternoon all season when Rangers have conceded twice. One point from two games, and whatever was being said then, the record since has had an answer for all of it.
The answer is the run above, and the twentieth of September at its end. That one was played at Celtic Park, with Rangers as the away side, and it finished one-nil. Read the five results again and notice the texture: four of them one-nil, one of them two-one, six goals scored in five wins. This is what a team grinding looks like when the grinding keeps working. Four one-nils in five games is not an accident by now; it is a method, and the afternoon at Celtic Park was its loudest expression.
The derby ledger around it is more colourful. A nil-nil at home on the thirty-first of August 2025. A three-one win at Celtic Park on the third of January 2026 — that one reads one-three in the file, which is the home way round. A two-two at home on the first of March. A three-one defeat at Celtic Park on the tenth of May. Then this September's one-nil, again at Celtic Park. Two of the last three visits there have ended in a win, which is the sort of record derbies are actually made of.
Now compare all of that with the end of last season, because it reads like a different sport. On the twelfth of April, six-three at Falkirk — three-six in the file — nine goals and Rangers taking six of them. On the twenty-sixth of April, a two-three home defeat by Motherwell. On the tenth of May, the one-three at Celtic Park. On the thirteenth, a one-two at home to Hibernian. And on the sixteenth of May, five-two at Falkirk, which reads two-five. Two games with Falkirk in the spring, eleven goals scored, five conceded, and two defeats at home either side of the fun.
The home and away halves of this season barely look like the same team. Three at home — the Hibernian defeat, then one-nil over Motherwell and one-nil over St Mirren — three scored, two conceded. Four away — one-one at Dundee United, one-nil at Aberdeen, two-one at Falkirk and the one-nil at Celtic Park — five scored, two conceded, and no defeat among them. The road, of all places, is where this season has been built.
From all of that chaos to four one-nils and a two-one is quite the adjustment. Second, two points off the top, and a defence that has forgotten how to concede twice. The season is turning into one of small rooms and locked doors. So far the doors keep holding.
By the numbers — Premiership (league only): 2nd · 7 played · 5-1-1 · 8-4 · 16 pts · form WWWWW (most recent last). All data from ScoreCrowd's match records, retrieved 24 September 2026.