🔗 Share this article

JAMBOS BLAZING

Maybe the sole surprising element of Hearts' triumph over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish top flight was just how taken aback people seemed when news of the outcome and its consequences for the summit of the table emerged. Although this convincing victory at their home ground, which puts the Jambos top of the table and eight points clear of their rivals, was seismic in nature, no one who has been following the fortunes of either team this season will have been even remotely shocked by the result.

Over the last four decades, the Glasgow duopoly of Celtic and Rangers have divided the Scottish football between them, turning fitba to almost a punchline in the process. Several matches into the present campaign it has become apparent that Hearts – who count Stephen Hendry, Sir Chris Hoy and Ken Stott among their celebrity fans – might just be prepared to strike while the Old Firm iron is at its weakest.

THE CHAMPIONS' SLUMP

While a lot of the attention in Scotland has been on the absolute bin-fire being endured by the Ibrox club, the full-spectrum nightmare of the situation at their stadium has meant that Celtic's slightly less terminal decay has been able to fester below the radar. The reigning champions have so far lost 10 points from nine fixtures this season under Brendan Rodgers. The team's boss has acquired the distant look of a individual who constantly consulting his schedule to see how many time are left until his deal ends, and awoke this morning to discover the answer is 246.

"No one has put in more effort in all my time at the club," he informed the media following the defeat, after they had doubted his appetite for any kind of a title fight. "Therefore the drive is present to try and reverse the standards that we're at. Everything is under control, it's still so early."

NEW CHALLENGER

Considering the dreadful start to the campaign being experienced by Rangers, the Celtic boss and his players could typically be anticipated to get away with their own failure to roar out of the traps, but this year an Edinburgh disruptor has joined the mix. Despite being obliged to function with a budget that isn't so much a small portion of Celtic's as a minuscule amount in comparison, Hearts have added the money and knowledge of Tony Bloom to the SPL mix. As well as putting in ten million pounds during the off-season, the Premier League figurehead has granted the club sole use of his top secret analytics-based proprietary scouting player identification system.

In Oisin McEntee, a Greek talent and Cláudio Braga it has allowed them to unearth unpolished gems from an English lower-league side, the Slovak first division and the Norwegian second tier, among other lesser-known leagues, for the total price of a modest car. Spotted at their home venue on Sunday wearing a club colours, the famously shrewd sports betting expert could be seen celebrating each score with the gusto of a man who had almost certainly realized the oddsmakers had massively misjudged his team's prospects of defeating the out-of-sorts title holders, and filled his boots as a result.

COACH'S RESPONSE

"I don't think it's a message-sending victory," said the facial-haired Hearts gaffer the head coach after his team's latest success, their eighth in nine league matches. "It might be for others on the outside looking in. It might change perceptions. It might validate views that there's a fine line. But we must be realistic, we're really pleased with what the players have given us. Technically, we look in a strong position, and definitely physically we seem in a good place, so we hope it persists. Naturally, it's not a position that this club is used to being in." No, the manager, it is not. But the wonderful, analytics-backed truth is that for the initial occasion in many years, the Scottish game might genuinely have a title race that somebody other than the traditional powers can claim.