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HEARTS ON FIRE

Perhaps the only surprising element of Heart of Midlothian's triumph over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish top flight was the extent to which surprised observers seemed when reports of the outcome and its consequences for the summit of the table circulated. Although this 3-1 win at Tynecastle, which puts the Jambos leading of the league and a significant margin ahead of Celtic, was seismic in scale, no one who has been tracking the progress of both squad this season will have been in the least shocked by the final score.

Over the last four decades, the Glasgow duopoly of the Old Firm have carved up the Scottish football between them, reducing fitba to something of a joke in the meantime. Nine games into the current season it has become clear that Hearts – who count celebrated snooker player, Sir Chris Hoy and renowned actor among their famous supporters – might just be prepared to make their move while the Old Firm influence is freezing cold.

CELTIC'S SLUMP

While much of the focus in the Scottish game has been on the disastrous season being endured by the Ibrox club, the full-spectrum nightmare of the circumstances at their stadium has resulted in that the title holders' slightly less terminal decay has been allowed to worsen unnoticed. The defending title winners have so far dropped 10 points from nine fixtures this term under their manager. The team's boss has acquired the thousand-yard stare of a man who constantly consulting his schedule to find out how many days are left until his contract expires, and awoke this day to discover the answer is over two hundred.

"No one has put in more effort in my entire tenure at the club," he informed the media following the defeat, after they had doubted his appetite for any kind of a championship battle. "Therefore the drive is present to try and reverse the standards that we're at. It's absolutely fine, there is plenty of time."

EDINBURGH DISRUPTOR

Given the horrific start to the campaign being experienced by the other Glasgow side, Rodgers and his players could typically be expected to get away with their own failure to roar out of the traps, but on this occasion an capital city challenger has joined the fray. In spite of being forced to function with a war-chest that is not just a tiny fraction of their rivals' as a comparative budgetary baw-hair, Hearts have added the investment and expertise of Tony Bloom to the SPL mix. In addition to putting in £10m during the summer, the Premier League figurehead has provided Hearts sole use of his highly confidential analytics-based proprietary scouting player identification system.

In an Irish defender, a Greek talent and a Brazilian prospect it has allowed them to unearth hidden talents from an English lower-league side, the Slovakian top flight and the Norway's second division, among other exotic footballing outposts, for the total price of a modest car. Seen at Tynecastle on matchday wearing a Hearts scarf, the notoriously astute professional gambler could be seen cheering each goal with the enthusiasm of a man who had almost certainly realized the bookies had massively misjudged his side's chances of beating the out-of-sorts title holders, and placed large bets accordingly.

COACH'S RESPONSE

"In my opinion it's a message-sending victory," said the facial-haired team manager the head coach after his side's most recent victory, their eighth win in nine outings. "It might be for those 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 lads have provided us. Technically, we appear in a good place, and certainly in fitness we seem in a good place, so we hope it persists. Of course, this is not a situation that the team is used to being in." No, Derek, it isn't. But the glorious, data-driven truth is that for the first time in many years, the Scottish game might genuinely have a championship battle that somebody other than the traditional powers can win.