SPL: Celtic scored two late goals to beat Dundee United 2-1 on Saturday, closing on the Scottish premier league title and equalling the 40-year-old British record for consecutive league wins.
The leaders trailed to Alan Archibald's 61st-minute opener but substitute Shaun Maloney equalised nine minutes from time and Chris Sutton converted a penalty to leave Celtic 13 points clear of Rangers, who were held to a 1-1 draw by Aberdeen.
It was Celtic's 70th unbeaten home match and equalled the record of 23 straight wins set by Scottish second division side Morton in 1963/'64.
"It was a wonderful victory and I'm delighted we've won the match," Celtic manager Martin O'Neill said afterwards. "We had to try and win the game against a very resilient Dundee United side and I thought that looked improbable.
"But you can never tell with this side. They will always go right to the last even when we aren't playing well and that just summed up their character."
Stuart Duff brought down Stilian Petrov to concede the penalty for Sutton's winner, and United's misery continued when striker Billy Dodds was sent off for a second yellow card in the dying minutes.
Afterwards United goalkeeper Paul Gallacher accused Petrov of diving. And United manager Ian McCall was angry with the winner and branded Petrov "cute" for his tumble under the challenge of Duff, which was echoed by Gallacher.
"You could see it on his face he was hoping for it," said the Scotland international. "And with 60,000 there you believe he was going to get it. Petrov was going at pace but the contact was minimal if there was any at all."
But team-mate Jackie McNamara jumped to the defence of the Bulgarian international skipper.
"They had a penalty claim and we had one with Chris (Sutton) so I think it evened itself out," he said. "Television pictures will prove that it (Petrov incident) was a penalty for us."
Champions Rangers's hopes of retaining the title continued to fade despite Frank de Boer's late goal salvaging a 1-1 draw at Aberdeen.
Alexander Diamond's second-minute goal put Aberdeen on course for their first win over Rangers since 1998 but defender de Boer found the net with a header to equalise three minutes from time.
"The point is of little use to us but at least we started to get forward a little more in the second half," said Rangers manager Alex McLeish.
"It's the best Aberdeen have done against us here in the first half, but we had something to do with that and were absolutely inept in the first half. It was shocking. You have to be ready to go from the start and there was too much apprehension in the side."
A combination of poor finishing and inspired saves from Rangers goalkeeper Stefan Klos denied the home side and De Boer made them pay when he claimed his first goal for Rangers from Paolo Vanoli's free kick.
