Paddy Power deserves credit for how they’ve unleashed the perma-rage.

You have to hand it to online bookmaker Paddy Power. They know exactly how to trigger the Perma-Rage Brigade across the city.

Their videos following major Ibrox reversals are usually hilariously well judged, but their latest effort has provoked a level of fury which even by normal standards is quite something.

The genius of it is not really the advert itself. It is who they persuaded to appear in it.

As most people will know by now, Paddy Power has already paid out on Celtic winning the league. Bets were taken before the season began, yet after only one round of fixtures the bookmaker decided it had seen enough.

So unimpressed was it by Derek McInnes’ opening performance, and apparently so impressed by Celtic already establishing a two-point advantage, that it paid out extraordinarily early.

Ibrox supporters were unhappy enough about Paddy Power making a spectacle of that decision after the opening weekend. Today, however, the bookmaker released another advert backing up its decision, and that one has really set them off.

Because Paddy Power secured the services of Kris Boyd, Alan Hutton and Mark Hateley.

All three offer their supposedly serious responses to the bookmaker paying out on Celtic, only for their objections to become increasingly drowned out as the Paddy Power voiceover takes over and the whole thing descends into beautifully orchestrated Perma-Rage.

It is a neat piece of work.

Obviously Boyd, Hutton and Hateley know exactly what they have signed up for. They know their responses are going to be talked over, they know they are effectively part of the joke and they know Celtic supporters will laugh at it.

That point matters, because I know exactly what some people will say about this article. They will accuse me of being childish, tribal or gleeful at the misfortune of the club across the city. Fine. As if they expected anything different. As if they expect me to deny it. It’s all true, your honour, I am rightly accused.

But if three famous former Ibrox players are willing to participate in the joke, knowingly and willingly, then I am struggling to see why anybody should expect me to behave with solemn restraint. They are in on it. They have taken the money, read the lines and allowed themselves to become part of a national bookmaker’s punchline at the expense of the club they (according to the Lie) once represented.

So, forgive me if I do not feel especially guilty about laughing. If Kris Boyd, Alan Hutton and Mark Hateley are allowed to have a bit of fun with it, then Celtic supporters are certainly entitled to enjoy the joke as well.

Most of us are delighted with the gag. The Ibrox support is considerably less amused. What appears to bother them most is not even Paddy Power taking the piss. They expect that. What really stings is seeing three of their own former players willingly participate in it, and, for once, I actually understand their anger.

Were Celtic being openly mocked in a national advertising campaign and three famous former Celtic players were happily appearing in it for a fee, I would probably be furious as well. I would wonder what the hell they were doing.

That does not make this any less funny from where I am sitting.

In fact, it makes it funnier. Because the complaint that Celtic supporters should somehow rise above the mockery becomes impossible to take seriously when former Ibrox players themselves are monetising it.

Nobody dragged them into the studio. Nobody tricked them into taking part. They knew exactly what the advert was. They knew what the gag was. They knew who the target was. And they signed up anyway. That is glorious.

That is what turns this from ordinary football trolling into something much more painful for the fans across town.

Because this is increasingly what the Ibrox club has become: a source of mockery, amusement and easy material for people looking for a joke. Now even some of its own former players are willing to join in.

That is quite a fall for an institution whose predecessor once thought itself so important that people around it spoke as though it occupied a unique place in Scottish society. “The second biggest institution after the Church” and all that.

Mockery is where the present club has ended up.

And, frankly, it has earned plenty of it.

This is a club which emerged from the wreckage of another one and immediately attempted to inherit all of its mythology: the grandeur, the supposed superiority, the expectations and the sense of entitlement.

What it did not inherit was the power. It did not inherit the wealth. It did not inherit the dominance, and there was plenty of that bought on cheap credit which eventually came back to haunt them in the worst possible way.

People sometimes forget that the old Ibrox club won the final three league titles before Celtic reclaimed the championship in 2012. Ironically, the spending required to maintain that level was part of the wider financial catastrophe which eventually consumed it.

Their replacement club required a global pandemic and an extraordinary season simply to win one league title and last season, it finished third. It was not even the first time since scrabbling its way to the top flight that it had done so.

This is not some powerhouse temporarily experiencing a difficult patch. It is a club which has spent much of the last decade lurching between crisis, rebuild, revolution and another crisis.

The Americans were presented as the great new hope. They were going to transform everything, professionalise the operation and provide the financial strength required to restore Ibrox to the position its supporters believe is its natural entitlement.

So far, whatever they think they are improving, the results remain distinctly unimpressive. They have put money on the table. They simply have not spent it particularly well. That is where the humour around the Paddy Power advert becomes sublime.

It was not supposed to be this way.

On Ibrox forums, plenty of supporters are trying to take it in the spirit intended. They are laughing along, making jokes and pretending it does not bother them. Underneath that, though, there is real anger.

Because this is their level now.

They have to pretend they find the mockery amusing because admitting how much it hurts would be worse. And the most uncomfortable aspect of all is that they cannot simply dismiss this as Celtic supporters being obsessed or Paddy Power being anti-Ibrox.

Not when Kris Boyd is sniggering along too. Not when their own guys are standing in the advert. Not when their own former players are taking part in the joke. Not when their own heroes are helping deliver the punchline.

That takes away one of the easiest defences they normally have.

I would not enjoy it were Celtic in their position.

Hell, Celtic supporters are furious with our own board while we are still winning trophies. Imagine supporting the club across the city while watching Celtic complete five consecutive titles and prepare to chase number six, while your own club cannot even reliably finish second.

Imagine being on the receiving end of the joke every few weeks and knowing that even when Celtic is operating at its most dysfunctional, we can still look down the table and see you there.

Things like this make my day. Perhaps they should not. It is a small pleasure, a simple pleasure and one built almost entirely from schadenfreude.

We are constantly told that taking pleasure in the misfortune of others is unhealthy. The therapists and wellness gurus tell us to practise kindness, empathy and positive thinking. Football supporters know better. We are tribal creatures.

For all the high-minded nonsense sometimes spoken about football bringing everybody together, there are rivalries where absolutely nobody wants the other side to be happy. This is one of them. And in this case, I have the perfect defence.

If Boyd, Hutton and Hateley can laugh all the way to the bank while participating in the mockery, I am damned if anyone is going to tell me I should sit here with a sombre face pretending not to enjoy it.

I occasionally pretend to feel guilty about that because it makes me sound like a nicer person. I do not actually feel guilty at all.

This is a support from which we still hear songs and sentiments about being up to their knees in our blood. This is a club whose culture has long contained an extraordinary belief in its own superiority and exceptionalism.

My sympathy reserves are therefore running exceptionally low.

I love seeing them mocked. I love seeing them laughed at. I love that they provide so many opportunities for everyone else to do it. And I particularly love that we have apparently reached the stage where some of their own famous former players are willing to get involved in the joke for a few quid.

For a support obsessed with ideas about standards, dignity and what their institution supposedly represents, that must hurt more than anything Paddy Power itself could have devised.

The bookmaker deserves credit for understanding precisely where to place the knife.

Paying out early was funny enough. Getting Boyd, Hutton and Hateley to appear in the follow-up was inspired.

Congratulations as well to anyone who actually placed a bet on Celtic and has already collected. I doubt anybody has retired on the proceeds, but even winning a few quid from this must feel exceptionally satisfying.

Because the money is not really the payoff.

The payoff is that a national bookmaker has looked at one round of Scottish Premiership football, looked at Celtic, looked at Derek McInnes and the Ibrox club, and effectively declared: we have seen enough.

That is the real payout.

And sure, the Ibrox players and management can pin the advert on the dressing-room wall. McInnes can use it in team talks. They can tell themselves that everyone is laughing and that they are going to prove the doubters wrong.

But what more motivation should they require?

Celtic has just won a fifth consecutive league title and is attempting to make it six. Should that not already provide sufficient motivation, a Paddy Power advert is unlikely to manufacture whatever is missing.

That is why I find the whole thing so enjoyable.

The bookmaker did not create the joke. The Ibrox is the joke.

Paddy Power simply recognised it, hired three of their former heroes and turned up with a camera. And if Boyd, Hutton and Hateley are happy enough to join in the laughter, then nobody gets to lecture me for doing exactly the same.

Judging by the reaction across the city, they landed the punchline perfectly.

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