Lennon not taking anything for granted in title race

Neil Lennon has insisted that the title race is far from over despite Celtic opening up a ten point lead over Rangers.

The defending champions swept Hearts aside on Wednesday, running up a 5-0 win as Rangers fell to defeat at Kilmarnock.

Five different players were on the scoresheet as Celtic continued their impressive form since the winter break but Lennon refused to get carried away.

“It might give them a bit of confidence but that’s about it,” he said. “We have a tough game on Sunday at Pittodrie. We are taking absolutely nothing for granted.

“The players know there is a long way to go and there will be twist and turns as we go along.

“We just need to concentrate on every individual game as it comes along. They were magnificent tonight.

“Their desire, hunger to play, score goals, run; everything you want from a team I got tonight. It was an emphatic victory.”

The only negative for the Celtic boss was the tackle on Scott Brown from Marcel Langer that saw the Hearts player sent off, with Lennon saying , it was “horrendous and could have done serious damage to Scott.”

Hearts boss Daniel Stendel saw his side opened up repeatedly and he admitted they had been stunned by Celtic.

He said: “I wanted to try and give the players the feeling we have a chance. Our plan was good but our game wasn’t like our plan.

“We played like rabbits in the headlights. From the first moment you could see the look.

“We tried to change our confidence on the pitch with the substitution of Conor Washington then we conceded two minutes later.

“After this we played a little bit better and we wanted to keep it in the second half but five minutes into the second half the game was decided.”