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JAMBOS BLAZING

Perhaps the only surprising aspect of Hearts' victory over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish Premiership was the extent to which taken aback people seemed when news of the result and its consequences for the summit of the standings emerged. Although this 3-1 win at their home ground, which leaves the Jambos top of the table and eight points ahead of Celtic, was seismic in scale, no one who has been tracking the progress of both team this season will have been in the least astonished by the result.

For each of the last four decades, the dominance of two Glasgow clubs of the Old Firm have carved up the Scottish league 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 number celebrated snooker player, Olympic champion and Ken Stott among their famous supporters – could be ready to strike while the Old Firm iron is at its weakest.

THE CHAMPIONS' DECLINE

While a lot of the attention in the Scottish game has been on the disastrous season being endured by Rangers, the full-spectrum nightmare of the situation at their stadium has resulted in that Celtic's comparatively less severe decline has been allowed to fester unnoticed. The defending title winners have so far dropped a considerable number from nine fixtures this term under Brendan Rodgers. The Celtic manager has developed the thousand-yard stare of a individual who constantly consulting his schedule to find out how many time are remaining until his deal ends, and awoke this day to learn the number is over two hundred.

"No one has put in more effort in my entire tenure at the club," he informed the media following the loss, after they had doubted his appetite for anything resembling a championship battle. "So the motivation is there to attempt to reverse the standards that we're at. It's absolutely fine, it's still so early."

EDINBURGH DISRUPTOR

Considering the horrific beginning to the campaign being endured by Rangers, the Celtic boss and his men could normally be expected to get away with their own inability to roar out of the traps, but on this occasion an Edinburgh disruptor has joined the fray. In spite of being forced to operate with a war-chest that isn't so much a tiny fraction of their rivals' as a minuscule amount in comparison, the Tynecastle outfit have added the money and knowledge of a renowned businessman to the SPL mix. As well as investing ten million pounds during the summer, the Brighton owner has provided Hearts exclusive use of his highly confidential analytics-based Jamestown Analytics recruitment tool.

In an Irish defender, a Greek talent and Cláudio Braga it has allowed them to unearth unpolished gems from Walsall, the Slovakian top flight and the Norway's second division, among other exotic footballing outposts, for the total price of a modest car. Spotted at Tynecastle on Sunday sporting a club colours, the notoriously astute professional gambler could be seen cheering each score with the enthusiasm of a man who had likely noticed the bookies had massively underestimated his team's prospects of beating the out-of-sorts champions, and placed large bets as a result.

COACH'S RESPONSE

"In my opinion it's a statement win," said bearded team manager the head coach after his team's latest success, their eighth in nine outings. "It might be for those on the outside looking in. It might change opinions. It might validate views that there's a tightrope. But let's not kid ourselves, we're really pleased with what the lads have provided us. Technically, we appear in a good place, 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." Correct, Derek, it is not. But the wonderful, analytics-backed truth is that for the first time in ages, the Scottish game might actually have a title race that a team besides Celtic or Rangers can claim.