Celtic's Dominance Under Martin O'Neill: Durán and Nygren Shine

Celtic’s ruthless edge under Martin O’Neill shows no sign of softening – and two of his forwards are driving the charge.

Camilo Durán has hit six goals in just seven appearances for the club in all competitions, including three in his last two Scottish Premiership outings. He is averaging a goal every 97 minutes in a Celtic shirt, the kind of return that turns a promising signing into a guaranteed starter.

On the opposite flank of Celtic’s attack, Benjamin Nygren is stitching the numbers together just as impressively. The Swede has been directly involved in five goals across Celtic’s four league matches this season, with three strikes and two assists. His record in the Premiership is quietly remarkable: he has scored or assisted against 10 of the 11 sides he has faced in the competition, with St. Mirren the only team to keep him off the sheet – and they have managed that over three separate meetings.

History, though, is stacked against St. Mirren when it comes to facing O’Neill’s Celtic.

Under the Northern Irishman, Celtic have played the Paisley side seven times in all competitions and won the lot, by an aggregate score of 16-2. Across the club’s long history, only three managers boast a more dominant perfect record against a single opponent: Jock Stein, who won all 11 of his games against Raith Rovers; Brendan Rodgers, nine wins from nine against Hamilton Academical; and Ange Postecoglou, eight from eight against Ross County.

The current league form fits neatly into that lineage of control. Celtic have strung together 11 straight league victories, four of them coming at the start of this season. Since O’Neill took charge at the beginning of last term, the Hoops have won 23 of 27 Premiership matches, drawing two and losing only two, at an imposing rate of 2.63 points per game.

St. Mirren, though, are not the soft touch those historical numbers suggest.

They come into this phase of the season with four wins from their last six league fixtures, drawing the other two. That run already eclipses their previous 20 league matches, when they managed just three victories alongside four draws and 13 defeats. The mood around the club has shifted; they are no longer simply trying to survive, they are trying to compete.

The wider pattern of the Premiership table offers them a sliver of encouragement. When the side starting the day in second has hosted the team sitting top of the league, the chasers have taken the points in three of the last five such fixtures, drawing one and losing only once. That is a sharper return than the nine equivalent meetings before that stretch, when the team in second won just twice.

So the numbers collide: Celtic’s relentless streak, O’Neill’s perfect record against St. Mirren, Durán and Nygren in full flow – up against a home side quietly building belief and a league trend that has occasionally favoured the hunters over the hunted.

Something has to give.