Pressure on Old Firm in title race, says Martin
· Yahoo Sports
Celtic and Rangers bear more pressure in the Scottish Premiership title race, even though Hearts are top, says former Ibrox head coach Russell Martin.
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Martin was sacked after Rangers' seventh league game of the season, when they were eighth, and successor Danny Rohl has taken them to third - within three points of Hearts with eight games to play.
Defending champions Celtic, under Martin O'Neill, are two points below Derek McInnes' Hearts and a point above Rangers.
"Because it's so close, there's pressure on the Old Firm always," Martin told BBC Radio 5 Live's Monday Night Club. "No matter what the situation, no matter what the game.
"I do think Hearts have less pressure than the other two right now. They can probably play on the underdog thing from now until the end of the season."
Martin's Rangers drew 0-0 with Celtic and lost 2-0 at home to Hearts early in the campaign.
"The Old Firm both have a chance of winning the league and the fans have been so frustrated and disappointed with their seasons," Martin said.
"Martin O'Neill and [assistant] Shaun Maloney have been there, won it between them so many times and [captain] Callum McGregor and the Celtic guys having had the experience of winning it, I think it could be really, really important.
"Derek McInnes and Hearts have had an amazing season.
"It's a really interesting and unique season. I really don't know which way it's going to go.
"Each week it sort of changes. No-one's really in flow. There doesn't seem to be a team that's playing at the peak of their powers. It's an eight-game season and it's going to be really, really exciting. You could easily see it going to either one of those teams."
Hearts, who lost at Kilmarnock on Saturday, finished second in the Scottish top flight in 1986, 1988, 1992 and 2006 but have not finished higher than third over the past 20 years.
And ex-Celtic forward Chris Sutton said on the Monday Night Club: "Hearts are really difficult to measure because it's so easy to just say... the pressure's off.
"I don't necessarily think it is amongst the Hearts fan base.
"I still think that Hearts all season, they've found a way to win. They're not a beautiful football team. They are well structured. He knows what he's doing, Derek McInnes does, in the way that he sets his team up, he knows the Scottish league inside out.
"The pressure's ranked up on Rangers."
Sutton was part of O'Neill's Celtic side from 2000-05 and said of his former club: "If Celtic win the league this season, they'd have done it without a centre forward. Think about that. Celtic have used five different centre-forwards.
"I think Celtic were 112 goals last season. Numbers-wise they are massively down on what they were last season [at 56]."