11pm

Tonight's result: Celtic 5, Motherwell 0.

A truly woeful defensive performance from Motherwell saw us go down heavily at Celtic Park this evening. We actually enjoyed a reasonable amount of possession in the game and 5-0 probably flatters the home side, but we rarely looked like scoring ourselves, and after conceding two early goals a humping was always on the cards.

There were two changes from the side which played at Ibrox on Saturday, with Brian McLean and Jim Hamilton replacing Jim Paterson and David Clarkson respectively.

We actually started fairly positively and took the game to Celtic, only for the home side to score with virtually their first attack when an offside looking Petrov slotted past Smith. Almost immediately it was 2-0 with a goal reminiscent of Rangers' first on Saturday - Maloney was left unmarked at the far post and was given time to control the ball before firing past Smith. Before we knew what had hit us it was 3-0 when Petrov was given far too much space at the edge of the box and sent a low shot beyond the goalkeeper. Any glimmer of hope we had was surely extinguished when Foran missed a sitter right on half time. The Irishman latched on to an under-hit backpass but took too long and allowed the Celtic goalkeeper to recover.

The second half was more of the same, with Motherwell enjoying reasonable spells of possession without really doing anything with it. A McLean header was cleared off the line by Camera in what was our only opportunity after the interval. The match was over as a contest by this point anyway, but when Nakamura fired home a 25-yard free-kick after 67 mins, much of the decent sized 'Well support began heading for the exits. Petrov completed his hat-trick with 11 mins to go, but I was already on my way home by then.

We simply couldn't cope with Celtic as an attacking force tonight, and although we knocked the ball about well at times we were never going to recover from the 10 minute or so spell which saw us go 3-0 down in the first half. For the second successive game our central defenders were completely given the run around, although they received little or no protection from the midfield which yet again was totally outplayed.

Hoping for a major improvement at Dunfermline on Saturday.

Team (4-4-2): Smith, McLean (Fitzpatrick 73), Craigan, Kinniburgh, Hammell (Paul Quinn 22), Corrigan, Kerr, Fagan, Foran (Clarkson 68), Hamilton, McDonald.
Subs not used: Marshall, Steve McDonald, Connolly, Darren Lee Smith.

Booked: Fagan, Kinniburgh, Quinn, Craigan.

Attendance: 57,388.