Celtic should resist this Simply The Best stuff and let Ibrox look foolish.

In the aftermath of the recent game at Ibrox, there was a lot of social media commentary doing the rounds—most of it absolutely ripping the pish out of their club, and rightly so, because they still insist on playing Simply The Best, when in reality they are nowhere near being the best. Not even close.

When we went to Ibrox at the start of last season, for Rodgers’ first game back against them, they played that song lustily and loudly.

Technically—if you’re willing to ignore the lies—it was to commemorate their supposed status as the most successful team in Scotland. Their daft claim to be the most successful club in world football has always been nonsensical rubbish.

But if they really want to cling to the Survival Lie, they could at least pretend to be the most successful club in this country. That day, and our win, was the sign that they were running out of time to make that claim.

Now it’s well and truly bust.

Now we’re on four in a row. Now we are, without question, the most successful club in Scotland—even if you do account for all the nonsense they tell themselves. So when they played Simply The Best at their ground just a couple of weeks ago, every single one of their fans should have been mortified.

Because that is mortifying.

It’s a claim that’s absolutely hollow, without foundation. “Simply the best” at what, exactly? Talking a good game, maybe. But certainly not on the football pitch. Certainly not in any way that makes the slightest bit of sense. The reality—and I know that’s a dirty word over there—is that we are a bigger club than them. And this was the season where denying it was no longer within their gift.

Because the record books now report it as a fact.

The Record has an article up today about the song saying it has become “synonomous with the club.”

What rubbish that is. They adopted it as a tune to taunt others with … now it only taunts them.

The article then makes the ludicrous claim that it’s because Tina Turner herself “had a fondness for the club”; another bizarre claim from the recesses of the Ibrox imagination.

There are some of our fans who think we should pinch Simply The Best from under them. That we should play it at the game today as a symbol—an affirmation – that we’ve pulled ahead, that we’ve won, and that they are now fit only to be mocked.

But I disagree entirely. Even if it gave us five minutes of laugh-out-loud value, I still wouldn’t do it.

We take our club a lot more seriously than that. We shouldn’t even entertain the idea of lowering ourselves to such a silly level, even at their expense.

No, when we send a message to them, it should be delivered in a way that actually matters, not in ways that don’t.

Leave the song where it belongs—leave it at Ibrox.

Let them play it on repeat as long as they like. All it does now is remind them of the fantasy world they live in, the delusions they labour under, and the complete disconnect between what they are and what they wish they were.

That song mocks them. And the longer they persist in playing it, the more they mock themselves. Yeah, it’s a joke. Of course it is.

They are a fool’s club. I bet they still have that “most successful club in world football” slogan painted on a wall somewhere. And I bet there’s still a part of them that believes it can stay up there, because one day they’ll be that again. Not that they ever were—but they’re deluded enough to think so.

We’ve taken so much away from them this season. I’ll write more about that later today. But the point is—we’ve stripped away things that a certain generation of their fans thought were theirs by right. All of it is gone. So, I understand the temptation some people feel to take away something else—to take away that song, to take away the superiority they used to feel, and the way it was reflected in the lyrics.

But still, I say this: the best version of that song that’s ever been sung was sung by Celtic fans. When we were there for Larsson’s 50th goal in the Martin O’Neill treble campaign. We won 3-0 that day. Moravcik was magnificent. The King was splendid. The football was devastating. But what I remember best, and most fondly, is that moment when they started playing it, 7,000 Celtic fans sang it and the rest of the ground fell silent.

It is still one of my favourite moments as a fan. So I should, in theory, be sympathetic to the idea of us taking that song from them. I should be one of the people pushing for us to play it today. Don’t get me wrong—I won’t complain if we do. But I know that if the decision were mine to make, I wouldn’t do it.

We’re a different kind of club. And I prefer to think of that song now as their own little piece of self-flagellation. I hope they keep beating themselves with it for years to come. Sooner or later their own supporters will clamour to have it removed—and then it will be. But for now, let it serve as a mechanism of torture.

Because at the end of the day, that is what they deserve.