The draw is the result that helps Celtic tonight. This is about us, not them.

Once again, Celtic fans are being told what it is we do and don’t want by people who don’t have a clue what it is we do and don’t want.

In this case, it is Gavin Berry of the Daily Record trying to write a scenario whereby Celtic would supposedly benefit if the Ibrox club won tonight, while also claiming that the preferred scenario for most Celtic fans would be an Ibrox defeat.

I mean, this is absolutely ridiculous. I don’t know how many Celtic fans this joker has been talking to, but most of us are very clear on what the best outcome is tonight.

A draw suits us fine.

Hearts drop the points we need them to drop, and the Ibrox club does not make up any ground on us. We still have the chance to go out next week at Celtic Park and pretty much put their lights out.

Yes, they would still have a chance if we lost both our remaining games and they won both of theirs. But even that scenario does not really add up for them, because if we lose our games, that almost certainly gives Hearts the final points they need to stay ahead of the Ibrox club anyway.

Celtic fans can do these sums as well as anybody. The idea that we want the Ibrox club to beat Hearts tonight and tighten this race is idiotic in the extreme.

Yes, Hearts winning tonight is dangerous for us. Of course it is. But if we win our three games, then we make up the three points on Hearts, and all that remains is goal difference. For every goal we score on the final day, they lose one too. It also assumes an awful lot about their ability to beat Motherwell and Falkirk first.

The draw is the perfect outcome for us though.

I am not going to let my intense dislike of the Ibrox club get in the way of wanting the result that is best for Celtic. Sure, a defeat tonight puts them almost completely out of the title race. But if that leaves us with a bigger Hearts problem, I would rather not have that problem.

Unlike a lot of other people, we are able to differentiate between what is good for us and what merely harms our opponents. Anything else is a peculiarly dumb way of thinking.

I rebel against this stuff because it reflects a much wider and uglier pattern of thinking. So much of modern politics is built on grievance, on persuading people to act against their own interests because they have been told that someone else deserves to suffer more.

We see it when people whose own lives are getting harder are encouraged to blame those on social security, rather than asking why wages are stagnant, public services are collapsing and the people at the top are getting richer. Their self-interest gets overridden by a manufactured resentment of someone else.

Football is not politics, and the stakes are obviously different, but the mental trap is the same. You become so focused on punishing the out-group that you stop asking what actually helps you.

We should not fall into that trap.

There are many reasons to loathe the Ibrox club. There are many reasons to intensely dislike its supporters. But hoping Hearts beat them tonight purely because of that, when it might have a negative impact on us coming into the final games, is just stupid.

It says that we hate them more than we care about ourselves.

That is not true.

So yes, tonight I am hoping for the draw. The only truly unacceptable outcome is an Ibrox win, because I do not want to see this title race tightened up. I do not want to see the gap narrowed to where a single slip could decide it.

The draw maintains Hearts’ lead over the Ibrox club and gives us the chance to hammer a nail into their coffin next week.

Berry claims that most Celtic fans want to see Hearts win. But the numbers in the poll don’t even back that up. Less than a quarter want to see Hearts win, and even fewer want to see the Ibrox club win tonight, which Berry has perversely termed the best outcome for Celtic.

The overwhelming majority, 53% of those polled, want the draw. Because that is the result that helps us most.

That is the result that gives us a cushion over the Ibrox club going into next week’s game. It is the outcome that means a win in that game knocks them almost completely out of it and gives us a clean shot at the last day of the title race.

Provided, of course, that Motherwell have not beaten Hearts the night before.

That might even give us the chance to win it at Fir Park ourselves.

Like I said, we are all capable of doing the maths here.

Celtic fans are much more cold-bloodedly pragmatic than we are given credit for. We know what we need to happen tonight. We know the outcome that gives us the best chance. That is what we are shooting for.

The draw tonight. Take Ibrox out of it next weekend. Keep a close eye on Hearts’ last two games before they come to Parkhead. Don’t let anyone kid you that we have not thought this through. We have all thought this through.

We have all considered, in the run-up to tonight’s game, what the best outcome would be. It is not about sentiment or hatred. It is not even really about rivalry.

This is just about maths. It is about cold, hard numbers.

There is a certain brutal logic in wanting Hearts to win tonight and almost finish Ibrox off. But we do not need Hearts carrying that kind of momentum either.

The draw is the result that serves Celtic best.

And that, despite what some people in the media seem to think, is what most of us care about.

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