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HEARTS ON FIRE

Maybe the only unexpected element of Hearts' triumph over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish top flight was just how taken aback observers appeared when reports of the result and its impact for the summit of the standings emerged. While this convincing victory at their home ground, which leaves the Jambos leading of the table and eight points ahead of Celtic, was seismic in scale, nobody who has been following the fortunes of both squad this campaign will have been in the least astonished by the final score.

Over the past 40 seasons, the dominance of two Glasgow clubs of the Old Firm have carved up the Scottish football between them, reducing fitba to something of a punchline in the meantime. Nine games into the current campaign it has become clear that Hearts – who count celebrated snooker player, Sir Chris Hoy and Ken Stott among their celebrity fans – might just be prepared to make their move while the Old Firm influence is at its weakest.

CELTIC'S DECLINE

While much of the attention in the Scottish game has been on the disastrous season being endured by Rangers, the complete turmoil of the situation at Ibrox has meant that Celtic's slightly less terminal decline has been able to worsen unnoticed. The reigning champions have so far dropped 10 points from their opening nine league games this term under their manager. The Celtic manager has developed the thousand-yard stare of a man who constantly checking his Google calendar to find out how many days are remaining until his deal ends, and awoke this day to learn the answer is over two hundred.

"No one has put in more effort in my entire tenure here," he informed the media following the loss, after they had questioned his appetite for anything resembling a title fight. "Therefore the drive is there to attempt to reverse the standards that we're at. Everything is under control, there is plenty of time."

EDINBURGH DISRUPTOR

Given the horrific beginning to the season being endured by the other Glasgow side, Rodgers and his players could typically be expected to escape scrutiny for their own inability to roar out of the traps, but this year an Edinburgh disruptor has entered the mix. In spite of being forced to operate with a budget that isn't so much a tiny fraction of their rivals' as a minuscule amount in comparison, the Tynecastle outfit have added the investment and expertise of Tony Bloom to the Scottish Premiership mix. As well as investing ten million pounds during the off-season, the Brighton owner has granted Hearts sole use of his top secret analytics-based proprietary scouting player identification system.

In Oisin McEntee, Alexandros Kyziridis and Cláudio Braga it has allowed them to unearth hidden talents from Walsall, the Slovak first division and the Norway's second division, among other exotic footballing outposts, for the total price of a modest car. Seen at their home venue on matchday sporting a Hearts scarf, the famously shrewd sports betting expert could be seen cheering each goal with the enthusiasm of a person who had likely realized the bookies had greatly misjudged his side's chances of defeating the struggling champions, and placed large bets accordingly.

COACH'S RESPONSE

"I don't think it's a statement win," said bearded Hearts gaffer the head coach after his team's most recent victory, their eighth in nine outings. "Perhaps it is for others on the periphery. It might change opinions. It may confirm opinions that there's a tightrope. But we must be realistic, we are delighted with what the players have given us. Technically, we appear in a good place, and definitely physically we seem in a good place, so long may that continue. Naturally, it's not a position that the team is used to being in." Correct, Derek, it is not. But the wonderful, analytics-backed reality is that for the initial occasion in ages, the Scottish game might actually have a title race that a team besides the traditional powers can claim.