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HEARTS ON FIRE

Perhaps the sole unexpected aspect of Hearts' victory over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish top flight was just how taken aback observers appeared when news of the outcome and its consequences for the top of the standings circulated. While this convincing victory at Tynecastle, which leaves the Jambos top of the league and eight points clear of their rivals, was seismic in scale, nobody who has been tracking the progress of either team this campaign will have been in the least shocked by the final score.

For each of the past 40 seasons, the Glasgow duopoly of Celtic and Rangers have carved up the Scottish league between them, turning fitba to almost a punchline in the process. Several matches into the present campaign it has become apparent that Heart of Midlothian – who count Stephen Hendry, Sir Chris Hoy and renowned actor among their famous supporters – could be prepared to make their move while the Old Firm influence is at its weakest.

CELTIC'S SLUMP

Although a lot of the attention in Scotland has been on the absolute bin-fire being suffered by the Ibrox club, the full-spectrum nightmare of the situation at Ibrox has resulted in that Celtic's comparatively less severe decay has been allowed to fester below the radar. The defending title winners have already lost 10 points from nine league games this term under Brendan Rodgers. The team's boss has developed the distant look of a individual who can't stop consulting his Google calendar to find out how many time are left until his deal expires, and awoke this morning to discover the answer is over two hundred.

"No one has put in more effort in my entire tenure at the club," he told the media following the defeat, after they had doubted his appetite for any kind of a title fight. "So the motivation is present to attempt to reverse the levels that we're at. Everything is under control, it's still so early."

EDINBURGH DISRUPTOR

Considering the dreadful beginning to the season being endured by the other Glasgow side, Rodgers and his players could normally be anticipated 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 function with a budget that isn't so much a small portion of Celtic's as a comparative budgetary baw-hair, the Tynecastle outfit have introduced the money and knowledge of Tony Bloom to the Scottish Premiership mix. In addition to investing £10m during the off-season, the Premier League figurehead has granted Hearts exclusive use of his top secret analytics-based Jamestown Analytics recruitment tool.

In an Irish defender, a Greek talent and Cláudio Braga it has allowed them to unearth hidden talents from an English lower-league side, the Slovak first division and the Norwegian second tier, among other lesser-known leagues, for the combined cost of a modest car. Spotted at their home venue on matchday sporting a Hearts scarf, the notoriously astute sports betting expert could be observed cheering 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 champions, and placed large bets as a result.

MANAGER'S REACTION

"In my opinion it's a message-sending victory," said the facial-haired team manager the head coach after his team's most recent success, their eighth win in nine outings. "Perhaps it is for those on the outside looking in. It could alter opinions. It might validate opinions that there's a tightrope. But we must be realistic, we're really pleased with what the players have given us. In terms of skill, we appear in a good place, and certainly physically we seem in a excellent shape, so we hope it persists. Naturally, it's not a position that the team is used to being in." Correct, Derek, it is not. But the glorious, analytics-backed reality is that for the initial occasion in ages, the Scottish game might genuinely have a title race that somebody other than the traditional powers can win.