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JAMBOS BLAZING

Perhaps the sole unexpected element of Hearts' triumph over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish Premiership was just how surprised observers appeared when reports of the result and its consequences for the summit of the table emerged. While this convincing victory at their home ground, which puts the Edinburgh side top of the league and a significant margin clear of Celtic, was seismic in nature, nobody who has been following the fortunes of either squad this campaign will have been in the least astonished by the final score.

For each of the past 40 seasons, the Glasgow duopoly of the Old Firm have carved up the Scottish football between them, reducing fitba to almost a joke in the process. Nine games into the present season it has become clear that Hearts – who number Stephen Hendry, Olympic champion and Ken Stott among their celebrity fans – might just be ready to strike while the Old Firm iron is freezing cold.

THE CHAMPIONS' SLUMP

While a lot of the focus in Scotland has been on the absolute bin-fire being endured by the Ibrox club, the full-spectrum nightmare of the situation at Ibrox has meant that the title holders' comparatively less severe decay has been allowed to worsen below the radar. The defending title winners 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 man who can't stop checking his Google calendar to find out how many days are remaining until his contract expires, and awoke this morning to discover the answer is over two hundred.

"I've never worked harder in my entire tenure here," he told reporters following the defeat, after they had doubted his appetite for any kind of a title fight. "Therefore the drive is present to try and flip the standards that we're at. It's absolutely fine, it's still so early."

NEW CHALLENGER

Considering the dreadful start to the season being experienced by Rangers, the Celtic boss and his players could normally be expected to get away with their own inability to roar out of the traps, but on this occasion an Edinburgh disruptor has joined the mix. In spite of being forced to function with a war-chest that isn't so much a small portion of Celtic's as a minuscule amount in comparison, the Tynecastle outfit have added the money and expertise of Tony Bloom to the Scottish Premiership equation. As well as putting in ten million pounds during the summer, the Premier League figurehead has provided Hearts exclusive use of his highly confidential analytics-based Jamestown Analytics recruitment tool.

In Oisin McEntee, a Greek talent and Cláudio Braga it has allowed them to discover hidden talents from Walsall, the Slovak first division and the Norwegian second tier, among other exotic footballing outposts, for the combined cost of a modest car. Spotted at their home venue on Sunday wearing a club colours, the famously shrewd sports betting expert could be observed cheering each goal with the enthusiasm of a man who had almost certainly realized the bookies had massively misjudged his side's prospects of defeating the struggling title holders, and filled his boots accordingly.

MANAGER'S RESPONSE

"I don't think it's a message-sending victory," said bearded Hearts gaffer the head coach after his team's most recent success, their eighth win in nine outings. "It might be for others on the outside looking in. It might change opinions. It might validate opinions that there's a fine line. But let's not kid ourselves, we're really pleased with what the players have provided us. In terms of skill, we look in a good place, and certainly physically we seem in a good place, so we hope it persists. Naturally, it's not a position that the team is accustomed to being in." No, the manager, it is not. But the glorious, data-driven truth is that for the initial occasion in many years, Scottish football might actually have a title race that a team other than Celtic or Rangers can claim.