It's time for a sense of perspective
By Hugh Keevins (@shinjukushug)
A sense of perspective in Scottish football is just about impossible to achieve given the intensity of the rivalry which exists between supporters, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to be appreciative of the truth.
Celtic have just won the Premiership title by the length of Sauchiehall Street. The attempt to detract from that achievement focuses on the obvious weakness of the competition when compared to headier days.
But what else can Brendan Rodgers and his players do other than illustrate the gulf in class between themselves and the opposition by scoring the number of goals they scored and amassing the record breaking amount of points they accumulated in a season of invincibility?
They have shown a respectful understanding of the advantages they enjoy by obliterating the teams in their way.
To repeat the phrase used by Rodgers in relation to his players and their daily dedication to the pursuit of excellence, you have to respect the work.
A season without defeat in league football can only be applauded. Ridicule is only an option for those whose last resort is unthinking defiance.
Claiming that the whole season has been about pre-ordination isn’t allowable either.
Rodgers wasn’t destined to win the title in his first season at Celtic Park. He worked damned hard to transform a previously directionless squad of players.
Rodgers isn’t destined to beat Aberdeen in the Scottish Cup final on Saturday and fated to become the third Celtic manager to win the Treble. He will work slavishly to achieve that place in history without ever thinking that he was meant to achieve that distinction.
The manager doesn’t believe he is the Special One. He is, in the week that will be dedicated to honouring Celtic’s Lisbon Lions, a willing worker towards the ideal of getting out of the game what you put into it.
He is the Driven One.
It is for others to see what they can do in terms of putting up a greater show of resistance, starting with Aberdeen at Hampden this weekend.
The final promises to be a fittingly epic end to the season and due credit for that state of affairs has to be given to the Pittodrie manager, Derek McInnes.
He has the same work ethic which characterises Rodgers’ efforts on Celtic’s behalf and that’s why we’ll get a game to remember.
It is, incidentally, perfectly acceptable for Rangers supporters to hope that Celtic lose at the weekend.
They weren’t meant to be thrilled by Celtic’s domination of the league and they can’t be expected to throw themselves wholeheartedly into a week of celebration over the fifitieth anniversary of their greatest rivals becoming the first British club to win the European Cup.
Any Rangers fan who had the financial means and the domestic latitude to book a city break somewhere on the continent for the next few days would be shown complete understanding.
This must be an extremely difficult time to be a Rangers supporter and that is why Pedro Caixinha must comprehend the scale of the job he has on his hands as the manager at Ibrox.
The 39 point gap which underlined the fact that Celtic were on a different level from Rangers in the league season just ended is an invitation to understand the reality of Caixinha’s situation.
He has had a free hit since taking over from Mark Warburton. Any set-backs the Portuguese encountered were dismissed as the understandable consequence of having inherited the previous managers’ flawed squad.
But the selfies and the dance routines witnessed at St. Johnstone’s McDiarmid Park after Rangers’ win there on Sunday would also have to be seen as the last waltz for Pedro.
Now he has to contest the theory that, for as long as Rodgers is in charge of Celtic, it is inevitable that Rangers will live in their rivals’ shadow.
When Pedro said Rangers had the best squad of players in Scotland it was a risible comment that has now come back to haunt the man who will attempt to hunt as many of those players as he possibly can over the course of the close season.
When Pedro said Aberdeen were approaching the end of their cycle as the second best team in the country it was a disrespectful dismissal of the side who promptly beat his team at Ibrox.
But let’s not curb the manager’s enthusiasm for creating back page headlines. It adds to the acrimonious way of going about our business which underpins the Scottish game.
It is now the time, however, for Caixinha to play a good game rather than talk one.
Tens of thousands of season tickets for Ibrox have been sold to people who bought them in good faith. They have stood by a team who were expected to finish a “Strong second” in the league, to repeat Dave King’s requirement.
What they got instead was a weak third place, nine points adrift of an Aberdeen side compiled on a fraction of the budget available to Rangers’ manager.
Now it is not enough to attempt a denunciation of Celtic’s title win as an irrelevance created by the poverty of the sides they come up against on a weekly basis.
Now is the time to prove it is not Rangers who have become an irrelevance.
To attend, over successive weekends, the PFA Scotland awards dinner and the one put on by the Scottish Football Writers Association was to be struck by Rangers’ diminished place in the grand scheme of things.
No awards. No nominations for awards. No chance of that being acceptable for much longer.
Celtic’s manager said on Sunday that his players were dedicated to excellence. He didn’t mean that was the case for this season alone. Rodgers meant that his squad would be in exactly that frame of mind today, tomorrow and for as long as he was in charge of them.
That is the gauntlet which has been thrown down in front of Caixinha and whoever it is who plays for Rangers next season.
It will be for the benefit of all of us if he is able to rise to that challenge.
It will mean that Rodgers has driven up the standard of the game here, and for that he should be thanked rather than derided by those who can’t see the bigger picture.