Rangers blink but twists still to come in colossal title race

In the season to beat all seasons there's a recurring question out there, even among day trippers to Scottish football - who's going to win this colossal battle for the Premiership title?

The answer one week is Hearts, the next Celtic, the next Rangers. It flits from one to the other. The momentum has moved about endlessly, not even from game to game but sometimes from half to half.

These are matches of nerve now. Bottle as much as skill. Rangers stumbled on Sunday on the back of laziness in critical times against a smooth and sophisticated Motherwell.

Four points behind Hearts and three behind Celtic, are Danny Rohl's team out of it? No. With only four games to go it's still too soon to make that call. If they lose against Hearts at Tynecastle next Monday night then you can stick a fork in them. If they win…

This month alone Celtic dug out a win in the 82nd minute at Dundee, Rangers came from 2-0 down at Falkirk to win 6-3 and Hearts were drawing with Motherwell with three minutes of normal time left to play - and won 3-1.

They were level with nine-man Hibs with four minutes to go at Easter Road on Sunday. It was a towering spectacle in the sun. Hibs - hanging on brilliantly against the odds, heading everything clear, throwing bodies in the way of shots, blowing a gasket to protect their point in front of an electrified home and away crowd.

Hearts were focused, relentless and eventually victorious; flawed but lacking nothing in guts and will to win. The post-match stats were monstrously skewed by their two-man advantage but Hearts had 23 shots on goal (their highest all season) to Hibs' four, they had 57 touches in Hibs' penalty area with Hibs having just three in Hearts' penalty area.

The visitors had 75.7% possession, 413 accurate passes to Hibs' 76, 47 crosses to Hibs' two and 11 corners to Hibs' zero. And yet it was only settled in the last minutes. Sporting theatre. Body and soul football. It was terrific.

There's been a sense that all of this is going to the wire, the last Saturday, maybe the last minutes of the last Saturday. Will all three be left standing before kick-off that day or will one have fallen away?

Rangers are in the most danger of taking themselves out of it. They can't stop scoring but equally, they can't stop conceding. There's a lot of flakiness in their make-up, possibly too many players spending too much time meandering through games.

Motherwell's slickness exposed Rangers, but who's to say that they won't expose Hearts and Celtic, too? Both have to go to Fir Park.

This season more than any other, one learns not to make predictions - or make them and be prepared to look daft. A helicopter Saturday is far from an outlandish thought and the more the cut and thrust continues the more goal difference becomes part of the conversation. Hearts' column sits at 31, Celtic's at 26 and Rangers' at 34.

If there is a sense that the league could be decided in the final minutes of the season then there's good reason for that. Between the three of them, critically important goals have been scored in the final 10 minutes, the final minutes and beyond the 90th minute in 27 different matches.

Hearts have won games in the 94th minute, 91st minute, 91st minute again, 88th minute, 87th minute and 86th minute. They've snatched a draw in the 83rd minute and 87th minute. The flip side is that they've dropped points in the 90th minute and the 88th minute.

Celtic, too, have a well earned reputation for digging it out, for overcoming frustration and winning games that they look like drawing. Resilience in other words.

They've won league games in the 91st minute twice, the 92nd minute, the 95th minute, the 96th minute and the 97th minute. They've also conceded an equaliser in the 87th minute and a winner also in the 87th minute. Over the score, they have a net gain of 14 points in those game-turning minutes of Premiership matches.

Rangers score more goals from the 90th minute and beyond than anybody else but some of those are just decoration. In those title-defining moments from the 80th minute, when games are tight and the pressure is on, they've gained six points and have lost five.

That, in some way, reflects Rangers' vulnerability when the heat is at its most intense, just as it was when again coming back from 2-0 behind on Sunday against Motherwell only to lose the game in the dying minutes.

There will be many more jaw-dropping moments in the tantalizing weeks ahead, many games that will take big turns.

This is a time for the fearless now. Who breaks first? Celtic's team is packed with league winners but none of them have done it like they're going to have to do it in the next four games. Even the serial champions are on unfamiliar terrain.

For months, Celtic and Rangers have been waiting for McInnes' men to crack. Maybe they thought that moment was coming at Easter Road, a day that reminded all once again that in this epic league season, it won't be over until it's over.