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JAMBOS BLAZING

Maybe the only unexpected element of Heart of Midlothian's triumph over the Glasgow giants in the Scottish Premiership was just how taken aback people seemed when reports of the result and its impact for the summit of the table circulated. While this convincing victory at Tynecastle, which leaves the Jambos leading of the table and a significant margin ahead of Celtic, was seismic in scale, no one who has been following the progress of both team this campaign will have been even remotely shocked by the final score.

For each of the last four decades, the Glasgow duopoly of Celtic and Rangers have divided the Scottish league between them, turning the beautiful game to almost a joke in the meantime. Several matches into the present campaign it has become clear that Hearts – who number Stephen Hendry, Sir Chris Hoy and renowned actor among their famous supporters – could be prepared to strike while the Glasgow duo iron is at its weakest.

THE CHAMPIONS' DECLINE

While much of the attention in Scotland has been on the absolute bin-fire being endured by the Ibrox club, the complete turmoil of the situation at their stadium has meant that the title holders' slightly less terminal decay has been allowed to worsen below the radar. The defending title winners have already lost a considerable number from their opening nine league games this season under Brendan Rodgers. The team's boss has acquired the thousand-yard stare of a individual who constantly checking his Google calendar to find out how many time are left until his contract ends, and woke up this day to learn the answer is over two hundred.

"No one has put in more effort in all my time at the club," he informed reporters following the loss, after they had doubted his appetite for any kind of a championship battle. "Therefore the drive is there to attempt to reverse the standards that we're at. Everything is under control, there is plenty of time."

NEW CHALLENGER

Considering the dreadful start to the campaign being endured by the other Glasgow side, Rodgers and his men could normally be anticipated to escape scrutiny for their own failure to roar out of the traps, but on this occasion an Edinburgh disruptor has joined the fray. In spite of being obliged to operate with a war-chest that is not just a small portion of their rivals' as a comparative budgetary baw-hair, the Tynecastle outfit have added the money and expertise of Tony Bloom to the SPL equation. In addition to investing £10m during the summer, the Premier League figurehead has granted the club exclusive use of his top secret data-driven proprietary scouting player identification system.

In an Irish defender, Alexandros Kyziridis and a Brazilian prospect it has enabled them to discover unpolished gems from Walsall, the Slovakian top flight and the Norwegian second tier, among other lesser-known leagues, for the combined cost of a mid-range family saloon. Seen at Tynecastle on matchday sporting a club colours, the notoriously astute sports betting expert could be observed celebrating each goal with the gusto of a man who had almost certainly noticed the oddsmakers had massively misjudged his side's prospects of defeating the struggling champions, and placed large bets accordingly.

MANAGER'S REACTION

"I don't think it's a message-sending victory," said the facial-haired Hearts gaffer the head coach after his team's latest victory, their eighth in nine outings. "Perhaps it is for others on the outside looking in. It could alter perceptions. It might validate views that there's a tightrope. But we must be realistic, we are delighted with what the players have provided us. Technically, we appear in a strong position, and certainly in fitness we look in a good place, so long may that continue. Naturally, this is not a situation that this club is accustomed to being in." No, the manager, it isn't. But the wonderful, analytics-backed truth is that for the initial occasion in many years, Scottish football might actually have a championship battle that somebody besides Celtic or Rangers can win.