{"id":154559,"date":"2025-11-23T00:06:06","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T00:06:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/154559\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T00:06:06","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T00:06:06","slug":"mcgregors-late-stunner-cuts-gap-to-hearts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/154559\/","title":{"rendered":"McGregor&#8217;s late stunner cuts gap to Hearts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Callum McGregor fired a spectacular winner deep in stoppage-time as Celtic cut the gap on William Hill Premiership leaders Hearts to four points with a 1-0 victory over St Mirren.<\/p>\n<p>The Celtic captain struck into the top corner from 25 yards to earn a win that looked unlikely for the majority of the game in Paisley.<\/p>\n<p>The champions failed to register an effort on target until stoppage-time and McGregor&#8217;s winner came beyond the four minutes of added time that the match officials had signalled.<\/p>\n<p>The hosts had earlier come closest to a breakthrough through Conor McMenamin, who hit the post after missing from close range.<\/p>\n<p>They also had the ball in the net when Liam Scales sent it past team-mate Kasper Schmeichel but the goal was disallowed for offside against McMenamin.<\/p>\n<p>Celtic looked set to drop points for a fifth time in 12 Premiership games but they put pressure on Hearts before the leaders\u2019 trip to Aberdeen on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p>The build-up to the game had been overshadowed by Celtic\u2019s abandoned annual general meeting, which saw the board jeered and principal shareholder Dermot Desmond\u2019s son, Ross, hit back at critics and brand a section of fans &#8220;bullies&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Anti-board sentiment and songs against Desmond were aired throughout the game and the winner was followed by a loud rendition of &#8220;sack the board&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>St Mirren had the upper hand in the early stages and came very close when Declan John drove forward and drilled the ball across the face of goal.<\/p>\n<p>McMenamin stretched and got a foot to the ball but his touch just took it out of the reach of Jayden Richardson and just past the post.<\/p>\n<p>McMenamin hit the post from 20 yards after a half-cleared corner and Miguel Freckleton shot over after another set-piece.<\/p>\n<p>The closest Celtic came in the first half was when Sebastian Tounekti cut inside Richardson and fired inches over.<\/p>\n<p>Johnny Kenny had a decent chance after Daizen Maeda won the ball but the new Republic of Ireland international sliced well wide.<\/p>\n<p>Celtic\u2019s interim management team of Martin O\u2019Neill and Shaun Maloney made a half-time change as Luke McCowan replaced Kenny, which allowed Maeda to play through the middle.<\/p>\n<p>The champions asserted themselves in possession and territory but not chances.<\/p>\n<p>They had a penalty appeal rejected by Kevin Clancy when McGregor\u2019s shot hit the elbow of Killian Phillips from close range.<\/p>\n<p>Maeda almost got through the middle of an organised Saints defence twice, but he was stopped by Alex Gogic \u2013 by a foul just outside the box \u2013 and Miguel Freckleton\u2019s last-ditch tackle.<\/p>\n<p>St Mirren looked dangerous in moments despite dropping deeper for long spells. Richardson had a shot blocked, Keanu Baccus saw a curling effort held by Schmeichel and the offside flag denied them in the 69th minute.<\/p>\n<p>McMenamin was in front of Scales as the Celtic defender scooped the ball towards goal as he prevented Phillips\u2019 flick reaching the St Mirren midfielder.<\/p>\n<p>Saints had a good chance late in the game when John received a return pass but the left-back shot straight at Schmeichel.<\/p>\n<p>Celtic finally worked Shamal George, when Dane Murray\u2019s header looped into the St Mirren goalkeeper\u2019s hands.<\/p>\n<p>That looked to be the final chance but McGregor fired into the top corner to spark a pitch invasion of celebrating Celtic supporters at the death.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Livingston manager David Martindale during the William Hill Premiership match at Ibrox Stadium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/0023855b-614.jpg\"\/><br \/>\nLivingston manager David Martindale<\/p>\n<p>Elsewhere, Rangers rode their luck to claim a fourth straight league win under new boss Danny Rohl as Mohamed Diomande\u2019s effort sealed a 2-1 victory over rock-bottom Livingston.<\/p>\n<p>But the visitors left Ibrox incensed after the referee and VAR officials failed to award them a late penalty despite replays clearly showing Tete Yengi\u2019s shot had struck the arm of Emmanuel Fernandez in the box.<\/p>\n<p>Fernandez powered home a ninth-minute header from James Tavernier\u2019s cross to give Rohl\u2019s men the lead.<\/p>\n<p>But Livingston, without a win in 10, levelled within 10 minutes when Yengi chased a long ball over the top and fired home.<\/p>\n<p>After Yengi\u2019s fruitless penalty shout, the striker had a further chance to snatch a winner when he was put clean through only to be denied by goalkeeper Jack Butland before the Gers had Diomande to thank for snatching the points 12 minutes from time.<\/p>\n<p>Promoted Falkirk continued their dream season by cruising to a 3-0 win over Dundee United at Tannadice \u2013 but home keeper Yevhen Kucherenko had a day to forget.<\/p>\n<p>Kucherenko spilled a tame shot from Calvin Miller to give the Bairns a third-minute lead and 19 minutes later he spectacularly punched a Falkirk corner into his own net.<\/p>\n<p>Amar Fatah tried to rouse the hosts when he looped his header against the bar but Kucherenko\u2019s nightmare was complete on the hour mark when he misjudged a high ball forward and was caught in no-man\u2019s land as Brian Graham beat him to slot home Falkirk\u2019s third.<\/p>\n<p>Goals from Kieron Bowie and Jamie McGrath proved enough for Hibernian to dispatch struggling Dundee at Easter Road.<\/p>\n<p>Bowie\u2019s superb low finish on the half-hour mark put Hibs ahead and any embarrassment Bowie felt for a howling miss under the crossbar was forgotten when McGrath squeezed home Hibs\u2019 second on 59 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>Kilmarnock boss Stuart Kettlewell is under more pressure after his side slid to their sixth straight loss in a 3-1 home defeat to Motherwell.<\/p>\n<p>Two goals from Tawanda Maswanhise within the first half-hour got Kettlewell\u2019s former club off to a flying start before a goal from Scott Tiffoney gave Killie hope at the start of the second half.<\/p>\n<p>A 68th-minute penalty from substitute Apostolos Stamatelopoulos restored Motherwell\u2019s two-goal advantage and by the time home substitute Lewis Mayo hit the woodwork late on, the points looked long gone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Callum McGregor fired a spectacular winner deep in stoppage-time as Celtic cut the gap on William Hill Premiership&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":154560,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-154559","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154559\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/154560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}