One word. Magnificent. One more word. Unbelievable.
That is the finest Celtic performance I’ve witnessed at Ibrox ever. I am 40. Ever to me means different things than it does to others. But I don’t know that it wasn’t the best Celtic display there has ever been at the ground. Let others decide that.
Let’s have a little history though, and let’s, for a moment, give the other side their most potent myth; let’s say we accept the Survival Lie (although we don’t) and that they are the same team. This is the biggest away win in the history of the fixture.
If you consider that even in the 6-2 season we suffered a 5-1 reversal it is easily the most potent head to head pummelling in the Celtic – Rangers history.
If we accept the history continuing today, which of course none of us does.
Now tell me, honestly, that this would have happened under Warburton? Or even Murty, who came to Celtic Park and snatched a late draw? We would have won against those guys but I suspect it would not have looked like this.
And what was this today? It was a ruthless, spectacular, one sided slaughter.
Listen, I’m a little drunk so I won’t even attempt to make a great deal of sense.
But Sevco has made every mistake its possible to make from the point where the club sprung up to the point we’re at today. If you were trying – deliberately, wilfully trying – to destroy a football team you could not do better than the people in charge there have done themselves.
Today was the revenge for every torment and pain we suffered in all of the dark years and had their supporters and the club’s founders accepted the death of Rangers and agreed this was a NewCo we wouldn’t be talking in such terms today.
They’d be just another team we’d beaten 5-1 home and away.
(I wish I could offer a prize for someone who points out how big this is today by telling me the last time we did that in our history, and who the team was … you’ll have to settle for my gratitude and the kudos which I will certainly grant you in the next piece.)
I will write the piece this result and performance deserves later, perhaps tomorrow. If I can.
This is one we’ll be telling our grandchildren we were here to see.
It will be permanently seared on the consciousness of Sevco for all eternity.
This was a game-changer, and no mistake.
But for now, I’ll say this;
Last week, over on the CelticBlog Facebook page, I shared a rant from one of the Sevco fan sites on how awful it is for them right now. It was full of “Whilst we were picking our bums they were doing this; whilst we were picking our noses they were doing that”; overall, it was a piece of beautiful paranoia and heartfelt pain. And it ended with a simple question;
“When does this end?”
Today, I have a new question for them.
“Who says that it ends?”
See, today is not a result to be taken in isolation. As I said to my mate before kick-off today, all the ingredients were there for a match and a result that scorched their souls … it was only a question of whether our players would show up with business on their minds and be ruthless enough to do it. I knew the answer to that question two minutes into the game and five before we scored the opener.
This was always possible, today, because this is the road the teams are on.
And who knows right now where – or if – that road actually comes to a halt? From where we’re standing right now we can see mountains, fields, and more mountains beyond that … but as a smarter guy than me once wrote, “The road goes ever on and on.”
Does it end? Maybe, but I think they’ll be exhausted, perhaps even dead, long before we ever see a finish line.
Tomorrow belongs to us.