Brendan Rodgers points to 'other issues' at Rangers as Celtic boss holds sympathy for Philippe Clement

Brendan Rodgers says he has sympathy for Rangers boss Philippe Clement after his Celtic team steamrolled their rivals on derby day.

The Premiership champions won 3-0 at Parkhead on league business to open up a five-point gap on their rivals after just four games. Daizen Maeda, Kyogo and Callum McGregor all netted on a day where Celtic could have had even more goals.

Clement has been forced to field his Rangers team at Hampden amid delayed renovation works at Ibrox, and his summer recruitment has been done on a sell to buy basis. Rodgers says his team were hard to handle going forward and astute in defence, as he spoke of his respect for Clement.

The Irishman told Sky Sports: “In the moments we needed to defend we defended well. I thought we were so exciting going forward. I thought the speed in our game, how we attacked the space was exceptional. We got three and maybe could have had a few more.

“Everything we want, make it really difficult for the opposition and obviously the crowd play their part today as well. Overall, fantastic result and performance. We never want to rest, we want to get three, four, five and it could have been that. I thought Rangers started well in the game and you always have to respect.

“I respect Philippe massively, he’s having to work through a difficult situation of not being at the stadium and other issues. But for us we go into every game with that humility knowing we have to work. We have started the season so well with a real good intensity.”