The Higgins Stand-Off Is Over. Celtic Fans Can Now Focus Fully On The Team.

The Bernie Higgins stand-off is over. Did he blink, or did the board?

That matters, and it might matter a lot somewhere down the line, but that’s for another day.

There is important business to be done before we get to that. Like a cup final. Like getting this team over the January line. Like making sure that we give these players and Ange all the backing we can.

I agreed with the protests. I agreed with the way they were done.

I’ll have some stuff to say later on about them, over the course of the week probably, but mostly in response to the piece we published recently from James Dornan MSP.

I did tell him I’d do something in relation to it, and this seems like a good week to have a go at that.

But I’m not going to bang the drum too loudly about this being a victory for the fans.

I mean, it obviously is, but there’s nothing to gain from shouting that from the rooftops. All involved on the beaten side are trying to save face by having Higgins himself make the announcement, through a spokesperson, to the media.

We should let them. We should let them dress it up in whatever clothes they want. The man won’t be working at Parkhead, so the job is done and for now I don’t particularly care who arrived at the decision.

It’s important, yes, but for the time being I’ll be happy with the fact of it and think about what it means for the bigger picture later.

The whole thing was ridiculous, and I’m glad it’s behind us.

It is hard to believe the stupidity of this board of directors at times.

How could they ever have believed that an appointment like this would fly?

That it was in any way acceptable?

That it would be met with other than the deepest anger?

They probably did think they could ride out the storm.

Ha! They underestimated two things; the level of fury this would generate and the way in which the fans, as a whole, would come together in unified opposition to it. That clearly took them by surprise.

And of course, there’s a lesson in that for them if they care to learn it.

But that’s big picture stuff for another time.

This is cup final day and a big cloud has been lifted off of our support and our club as a whole.

The manager and the players will benefit from that from now until the January window, as they have, let’s not forget, for the vast, vast majority of this season so far.

There was never any question of not supporting the team, it was not up for debate, not part of this discussion.

But it did distract us from that.

No more.

Because this conflict, at least, has come to an end. The armistice has been signed. The two opposing sides can withdraw from the battlefield, and we can all have a little bit of peace going into the festive season.

Thank God for that.