Celtic loanee Stephen Welsh scored a late goal as 10-man Motherwell denied Rangers a chance to cut Hearts’ lead in the title race to three points by holding Rangers to a 1-1 draw at Fir Park.
The centre-back surprised Gers, who had been leading from six minutes, with his nod back for home side Heitor Bjorgolfsson in the penultimate minute of normal time, but added 12 men to the last 12 after Lukas Fadinger’s red card.
In fact, the draw was the worst for Motherwell, who enjoyed much of the play following Nicola Raskin’s opener. His superb finish from a through ball from Mo Diomande gave the visitors a rare moment of quality before the break.
Stephen O’Donnell should have done better with his header from a free-kick before Tawanda Maswanhise was denied by Jack Butland from a seemingly impossible angle. The Rangers goalkeeper hit the shot against the post and behind him.
Rangers’ Nicholas Raskin celebrated the goal, making it 1-0.
Motherwell continued to push at will, but Youssef Cermiti had the same move twice denied by Callum Ward that should have doubled Rangers’ lead.
Motherwell had a number of half-chances after half-time, but any hope of getting anything back from the game seemed to end when Fedinger’s yellow card for a lunge on Mikey Moore was upgraded to a red card after a VAR review.
But if anything, it excited the hosts. Björgolfsson should have equalized first, heading O’Donnell’s cross into the net and making a fine save from Butland, but he made up for it by nodding home the Welshman moments later.
The result leaves Rangers five points behind leaders Hearts, but they visit Ibrox on Sunday, which will be broadcast on Sky Sports.
Roll: If we win against Hearts, we will still be in the title race
Rangers head coach Danny Rohr:
“That’s not good. The good thing is there’s another chance.
“When you come back from so many points behind (from the beginning of the season), there is no time to rest. You have to come out on top again and again and win games.
“But as I said today, the title fight is not over yet. It’s a bit of a shock to drop two points so late.”
Sunday, February 15th 4:15pm
4:30pm kickoff
“But on Sunday we have another chance and if we react correctly and get the right result on Sunday, it won’t be easy but it’s still a chance for us and we’ll see.
“Our fans always expect and demand wins. This is what we demand. There’s a reason why our opponents haven’t conceded a goal since October (at home). As you can see, they were well organized.”
“We tried our best and were close to winning the three points until the last moment, but that’s football. Sometimes you concede late on and sometimes you have to score and you don’t.
“We have to move forward. I expect all three teams to have some ups and downs in this race. We have to play a good game on Sunday.”
Ask proud of ‘dominant’ Motherwell
Motherwell boss Basel Askou:
“We played three really good games against Rangers and improved our performance each time.
“Today was the best performance of these three players. They dominated the game from start to finish.
“They had a 10-minute spell in the second half, probably because we rushed things too quickly. Obviously they had a great moment to score a goal – it was a beautiful goal.
“But from there we took over and dominated, even if we were one man behind. We pushed and pushed and showed even more courage and quality. We deservedly earned the point.”
