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HEARTS ON FIRE

Maybe the only unexpected element of Heart of Midlothian's victory over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish Premiership was just how surprised observers seemed when news of the outcome and its consequences for the top of the table circulated. Although this 3-1 win at their home ground, which puts the Edinburgh side top of the league and a significant margin clear of Celtic, was earth-shattering in scale, nobody who has been following the progress of either team this campaign will have been even remotely astonished by the final score.

Over the past 40 seasons, the Glasgow duopoly of the Old Firm have divided the Scottish league between them, reducing fitba to something of a punchline in the meantime. Several matches into the present season it has become clear that Heart of Midlothian – who count Stephen Hendry, Sir Chris Hoy and renowned actor among their famous supporters – could be ready to strike while the Old Firm influence is at its weakest.

CELTIC'S SLUMP

Although much of the attention in Scotland has been on the absolute bin-fire being suffered by Rangers, the full-spectrum nightmare of the situation at their stadium has meant that Celtic's comparatively less severe decay has been able to worsen unnoticed. The defending title winners have already lost 10 points from their opening nine league games this season under Brendan Rodgers. The Celtic manager has developed the thousand-yard stare of a man who can't stop checking his Google calendar to find out how many time are left until his contract ends, and awoke this morning to learn the number 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 championship battle. "So the motivation is present to try and reverse the standards that we're at. Everything is under control, it's still so early."

EDINBURGH DISRUPTOR

Given the dreadful start to the campaign being experienced by the other Glasgow side, Rodgers and his men could normally be expected to escape scrutiny for their own inability to roar out of the traps, but on this occasion an capital city challenger has joined the fray. In spite of being obliged to function with a budget that is not just a tiny fraction of their rivals' as a comparative budgetary baw-hair, the Tynecastle outfit have added the investment and expertise of a renowned businessman to the SPL mix. As well as investing ten million pounds during the off-season, the Premier League figurehead has granted the club sole use of his highly confidential analytics-based proprietary scouting recruitment tool.

In Oisin McEntee, a Greek talent and Cláudio Braga it has enabled them to unearth hidden talents from an English lower-league side, the Slovak first division and the Norway's second division, among other exotic footballing outposts, for the total price of a modest car. Spotted at Tynecastle on matchday wearing a Hearts scarf, the famously shrewd sports betting expert could be observed cheering each score with the enthusiasm of a person who had likely noticed the bookies had massively misjudged his side's prospects of defeating the out-of-sorts champions, and placed large bets as a result.

MANAGER'S REACTION

"In my opinion it's a statement win," said the facial-haired team manager the head coach after his side's most recent success, their eighth win in nine league matches. "It might be for others on the periphery. It might change opinions. It may confirm opinions that there's a fine line. But let's not kid ourselves, we are delighted with what the players have given us. Technically, we look 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 the team is used to being in." Correct, the manager, it isn't. But the glorious, data-driven truth is that for the first time in many years, Scottish football might genuinely have a championship battle that a team besides the traditional powers can claim.