Midfielder Stephen Hughes swept home a stoppage time goal to rescue a 1-0 victory for Rangers away to Hibernian yesterday and keep the Scottish champions five points behind Celtic at the top of the table.
A feisty young Hibs side matched the visitors for long periods of a breathless Easter Road encounter until a late lapse in concentration saw Scottish under-21 international Hughes break free to smash a venomous shot into the corner of the net.
Celtic lead the table with 40 points from 14 games after Saturday's 3-1 home win over bottom club Partick Thistle, while Rangers move on to 35.
Henrik Larsson opened the scoring for Celtic, after they conceded an early goal, and Chris Sutton grabbed a brace later on.
Third-placed Hearts remained on 26 points after going down 2-1 away to Dundee United in yesterday's other match.
"The goal was worth waiting for and the pressure was on Stephen to score because he could have put it over the bar," manager Alex McLeish said.
"The players gave me a spirited performance if perhaps not the quality we were looking for and I felt we got in behind Hibs more in the second half."
Hibs manager Bobby Williamson said his players had only themselves to blame for not taking something from the game.
"You've got to have mental toughness which teams like Rangers and Celtic have and I'm trying to drill that into our players."
Hibs certainly enjoyed enough pressure in the first period against the Glasgow side. Home captain Ian Murray scooped the ball over from Alen Orman's cross with the goal at his mercy, while Shota Arveladze was forced to clear the excellent Mathias Doumbe's effort off his line with Hibs throwing bodies forward.
On Saturday, Martin O'Neill's men survived an early scare and a touch of the European blues to foil Gerry Collins's courageous cavaliers at Parkhead.
But Partick Thistle chairman Tom Hughes intimated yesterday that Collins had managed the club for the last time at Parkhead.
"We will discuss with Gerry and the other board members his future and assess the position of Partick Thistle," he said. "I wouldn't like to pre-empt anything but we'll go and have a discussion and one way or another end the speculation of this week because it can't go on."
