Rangers ........................................ 2

Chelsea .........................................0

Filip Sebo ripped off his shirt after blasting home a killer second for Rangers ¿ as the Ibrox men tore a strip off Chelsea's superstars.

The ecstatic Slovakian raced bare-chested to the Gers fans and was booked for celebrating following a series of trademark misses.

Rangers left it late ¿ but Nacho Novo netted the opener with five minutes left and Sebo's deflected strike sealed a deserved win over the English Premiership giants.

The friendly was played at a high tempo throughout and sets up Walter Smith's men perfectly for tomorrow night's Champions League qualifier against FC Zeta.

The starting line-up on Saturday will likely be the one that lines up at Ibrox ¿ barring any injuries¿ for the Euro tie.

The partnership of Davie Weir and Carlos Cuellar is solid. Gone, for sure, are the days during Paul Le Guen's era when Rangers lost cheap goals.

Weir was involved early on, sending a lovely through ball into the path of Kris Boyd. He raced in on goal but Petr Cech spread himself well to narrow the angle and block the striker's low shot.

There wasn't much else to test Cech in the first half but Rangers still caught the eye and made a positive impression.

Jean Claude Darcheville has made plenty of headlines in his short spell and will continue to do so. His lightning pace over 10 yards will cause panic in SPL defences and lead to errors that will create chances.

Ibrox skipper Barry Ferguson looks lean and controlled the flow of the game for his side. He raced from box-to-box several times and offered plenty encouragement to those around him.

However, the player who really stood out was Chelsea star Steve Sidwell who was different class as he sprayed passes about and showed controlled aggression. The central midfielder helped engineer a chance for Didier Drogba at the back post - but his header flew just wide of Allan McGregor's post. With midweek in mind, Smith made six changes at half time ¿ Andy Webster for Weir, Roy Carroll for McGregor, Kirk Broadfoot for Sasa Papac, Novo for Darcheville, Ian Murray for Alan Hutton and Damarcus Beasley for Boyd.

There's no doubt Gers have 13 or 14 strong and reliable outfield players. Beyond that, there must be doubts over what the rest can do. There still seems to be too many passengers on board.

One of the loudest cheers came in 61 minutes when joke figure turned cult hero Sebo replaced Lee McCulloch.

Just three minutes later Blues skipper John Terry was booked for hauling down Sebo as he threatened to race in on sub keeper Henrique Hilario. Novo then released the Slovakian for a one-on-one¿ but he mis-hit the ball just eight yards out and sliced past a post.

New season, same outcome. Well, temporarily, at least. His moment was still to come.

Cuellar was in the right place at the right time to clear Frank Lampard's 10-yard shot off the line.

But Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho wasn't happy with the space Rangers were being given and let his players know it.

His anger heightened in the closing stages as Gers scored twice. Novo struck an excellent opener with five minutes left. Chris Burke's good build-up found the Spaniard and he let rip past Hilario from 20 yards.

Two minutes later Sebo's shot from an acute angle deflected off Tal Ben Haim and flew over the head of Hilario.

His relief was evident - and he won't have cared about his yellow card for celebrating from whistler Stuart Dougal.

He needed that goal. Rangers needed that win. Now they must build on it The real business starts in midweek and anything less than a victory could cause untold damage.

After two seasons of false dawns for Gers, they now appear to be verging on the real thing. Celtic face a helluva fight to keep their title. It really is Game On.

Article courtesy of Mark Guidi at Sunday Mail.co.uk.