Clement’s survival is pathetic because it’s based on two games against Celtic.

In the run-up to the match at Ibrox, I wrote a piece about the Ibrox club’s alleged dilemma over their manager. In that piece, I suggested it was almost as if they were waiting for Celtic’s permission before they did the deed and sacked him—a decision everyone agreed was only a matter of time.

This morning, you might have read references to a Sunday Mail piece claiming their manager had “bought himself some time.” It’s remarkable to me how fixated that club remains on Celtic and how they base crucial strategic decisions on performances and results against us above all else.

How is it possible that a manager overseeing an 11-point deficit this season—following an eight-point deficit at the end of the last—can still be in a job? Is it all about money? Are we really to believe they lack the funds to sack a failing manager? What kind of club can’t take decisive action to remove someone who isn’t getting the job done because they’re worried about how to pay for it?

This morning, we have Barry Ferguson dismissing the suggestion that they might sign Marcus Rashford in this transfer window, as though that was an idea anyone needed to take seriously. The fact it was even addressed sums the club up: they exist in a twilight zone of fantasy. That whole club is crazy.

But that club is also obsessed. Obsessed with us.

As I wrote before the game, they weren’t going to make a decision on their manager based on anything other than what happened in that match. He went into the game knowing his job would be safer if he won, despite the results against St. Mirren and Motherwell—results that starkly confirmed everything their fans and board already knew about his long-term suitability for the job.

It’s obvious to anyone that Philippe Clement has more than justified his sacking. No one needs to argue the case for it; the league table from last season compared to now makes it clear. He has taken the club backwards—decisively backwards. That’s unarguable. So why is anyone pretending otherwise?

Part of it is that the Ibrox club is weak. It’s run by weak people, including the manager. A strong, decisive club would never have allowed a situation to develop where a failing manager could cling on based solely on results against one club. Yet here we are.

Another part of it is their absolute fixation on us. They genuinely believe that if they can beat us, they should be able to beat everyone else. They don’t acknowledge that other teams in the league have agency too. There’s an arrogance and egotism in that mindset that’s hard to credit. I’ll never understand what motivates such thinking.

It astonishes me how much beating one club can mean to their fans. They’re willing to forgive everything else for fleeting moments that mean nothing in the grand scheme of things.

My old man told me a story last year about meeting a Kilmarnock fan after they beat us in the League Cup. The guy was boasting that it would be the highlight of his year. He recognised his club wasn’t going to achieve anything significant, but beating Celtic in that cup game was, to him, worth a lacklustre campaign.

At first, I thought this was a pathetic way of thinking. But then I reminded myself of the perspective I come from. I’m used to seeing Celtic win titles and trophies. I’m used to seeing us secure silverware regularly. Maybe, if I wasn’t so accustomed to that, I’d feel the same way. I might see a single result against the champions—the best club in the country—as the highlight of my season, something to cherish.

And the question that automatically comes to mind is this: is this what we’ve reduced them to? Have we affected them to such an extent that a single result becomes their whole season? That a single victory over us gives them a reason to carry on?

Yesterday, I wrote about individual games we’ve won against them over the years—during times when we weren’t that good, when we knew we weren’t going to win things. Maybe I felt, in those moments, that a single victory against the Ibrox club was as good as it got as a Celtic fan.

But I don’t think so. Because I would never have accepted a situation where a Celtic manager kept his job on the back of one of those results, especially if he was failing everywhere else. As a fan, when you know, you know. You know when the situation at your club has deteriorated to the point of no return. You know when a manager is on his last legs. You can’t kid yourself about that.

Except, their supporters can. They’ve kidded themselves about it. They are kidding themselves about it right now. It’s only days since they lost to St. Mirren and drew with Motherwell. Those results rendered the match against us a dead rubber. They surrendered the title and cemented our double-digit lead.

I believe we will win this league by a double-digit margin.

I think the final margin will be greater than it is right now. I believe that because I don’t think they’re a good team, and I don’t believe Philippe Clement is a good manager. I don’t believe Clement would have survived this long if he were the Celtic boss. No Celtic manager in the modern era would survive a start to the campaign like this one, especially not after those two reversals in a week.

And I’ll tell you something else. All they’ve done over the past couple of days is set themselves up for a crisis he will not survive.

We are two months away from our next league game against them—provided we don’t draw them in the Scottish Cup—and I’ll put my neck on the line and say this: no matter what tactical plan we devise, it won’t be necessary because we will not face this guy again in a competitive league game.

He won’t last. He will not see the inside of Celtic Park as the Ibrox manager. He has survived only because they put in a good performance in the League Cup final and beat us on Thursday. Their club is basing his survival on those two games, as though they’re the only two that matter. Their supporters are willing to give him another chance because of those games.

But those games are in the past. What he does in the future will decide his fate, and I have no doubt that he’s a disaster waiting to happen.

Every humiliation that club has suffered up to now is on his shoulders as the man ultimately responsible for running the team. The next humiliation they suffer—and the series of humiliating results to come—will be on the people who kept him in post. Those who’ve aided and abetted this madness by focusing only on results and performances against Celtic bear some of the blame too.

That peculiar form of madness won’t last, though. It will be exposed as such sooner rather than later, and then they’ll have to act.

And you know what? Myself and others will be waiting for it.

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