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HEARTS ON FIRE

Perhaps the sole surprising element of Heart of Midlothian's victory over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish top flight was just how taken aback observers seemed when reports of the outcome and its impact for the top of the table emerged. Although this 3-1 win at Tynecastle, which puts the Jambos leading of the table and a significant margin ahead of their rivals, was seismic in nature, nobody who has been following the fortunes of both squad this campaign will have been in the least astonished by the final score.

Over the last 40 seasons, the dominance of two Glasgow clubs of Celtic and Rangers have divided the Scottish league between them, turning the beautiful game to something of a joke in the meantime. Several matches into the present campaign it has become clear that Hearts – who count celebrated snooker player, Olympic champion and renowned actor among their celebrity fans – might just be prepared to strike while the Old Firm iron is freezing cold.

CELTIC'S DECLINE

While much of the focus in the Scottish game has been on the disastrous season being suffered by the Ibrox club, the full-spectrum nightmare of the situation at their stadium has resulted in that Celtic's slightly less terminal decay has been able to worsen unnoticed. The reigning champions have so far lost 10 points from nine league games this term under Brendan Rodgers. The team's boss has developed the thousand-yard stare of a individual who can't stop consulting his schedule to find out how many time are remaining until his contract expires, and woke up this morning to learn the answer is 246.

"No one has put in more effort in my entire tenure here," he informed the media following the loss, after they had doubted his appetite for any kind of a title fight. "So the motivation is present to attempt to reverse the standards that we're at. Everything is under control, it's still so early."

EDINBURGH DISRUPTOR

Given the dreadful start to the season being endured by Rangers, Rodgers and his men could normally be expected to get away with their own inability to roar out of the traps, but on this occasion an capital city challenger has joined the mix. In spite of being forced to function with a war-chest that isn't so much a small portion of their rivals' as a comparative budgetary baw-hair, Hearts have added the money and expertise of Tony Bloom to the Scottish Premiership equation. As well as investing £10m during the off-season, the Premier League figurehead has provided the club sole use of his top secret analytics-based Jamestown Analytics recruitment tool.

In Oisin McEntee, Alexandros Kyziridis and Cláudio Braga it has allowed them to unearth unpolished gems from an English lower-league side, the Slovak first division and the Norwegian second tier, among other exotic footballing outposts, for the combined cost of a modest car. Spotted at Tynecastle on matchday wearing a Hearts scarf, the notoriously astute professional gambler could be observed celebrating each score with the gusto of a person who had likely noticed the bookies had massively underestimated his side's chances of defeating the struggling champions, and filled his boots as a result.

COACH'S RESPONSE

"In my opinion it's a message-sending victory," said bearded Hearts gaffer the head coach after his side's most recent victory, their eighth in nine outings. "Perhaps it is for others on the periphery. It could alter perceptions. It might validate views that there's a fine line. But let's not kid ourselves, we are delighted with what the players have provided us. In terms of skill, we look in a good place, and certainly in fitness we look in a good place, so long may that continue. Naturally, it's not a position that the team is used to being in." No, the manager, it isn't. But the glorious, analytics-backed truth is that for the first time in ages, the Scottish game might genuinely have a championship battle that a team besides the traditional powers can claim.