Ki Sung-yueng is hoping that home advantage will play a big part when they meet Rangers on 28 December. Ki and his colleagues had to show plenty of patience against a resilient St Johnstone side on Sunday, with keeper Peter Enckelman in good form.
It was on the hour mark that Gary Hooper broke the deadlock before the South Korean secured the points three minutes later. Celtic welcome Kilmarnock at home next week before the visit of Rangers, who won the first Glasgow derby at Ibrox 4-2 in September.
Celtic now have seven straight SPL wins under their belts and Ki is hoping that resurgent form, along with home advantage, will play a huge part in the outcome. He said: "I think we are in the mood now. We are a much better team than last time we played and we are playing at Celtic Park which gives a lot of confidence.
It is going to be a different kind of atmosphere than at Ibrox, we will have the majority of fans behind us. I haven't watched the Rangers games but they still have four points us over us at the top which means they still have the advantage but we are chasing now.
We just want to get three points every game, that is our target. It was a massive win (on Sunday) and we did brilliantly. They had seven or eight players in the box at times and it wasn't easy to break them down." Sunday did have a downside for the Parkhead side with the loss of defender Daniel Majstorovic. He had to go off in the first half after a clash of heads with Saints midfielder David Robertson, who was also replaced soon afterwards.
Manager Neil Lennon said: "It looks like a fractured cheekbone and it could be a fractured eye socket as well. It is a big blow because he has been immense for us. We will have to wait to see the extent of it but it looked a real sore one.
As I said, he will be a miss but we have cover." Asked about Majstorovic's challenge on Robertson, Saints manager Steve Lomas, who was "proud" of his side's performance, said: "I haven't seen it again but I thought the big centre-half knew he was 70-30 in favour. It might have just been an honest collision but I wouldn't bet my house on it."
Source: FOOTYMAD
