Erik Will Learn it's Different Strokes for Different Folks

When I was a child growing up in Partick during the 1950's there was a joke about the fancy building across the way from us on Dumbarton Road.

They used to say that the definition of an intellectual was someone who went into the Kelvingrove Art Gallery when it wasn't raining.

And there was an element of fact contained within the humour.

Long Summer holidays from school were spent playing football in Kelvingrove Park until a downpour came along, at which point you went inside the gallery for shelter and a bemused look at Salvador Dali 'n'at.

Now it appears Celtic have signed someone who is characterised as being a "culture vulture."

Erik Sviatchenko, newly brought in from FC Midtjylland for £1.5m, will come to realise in time that this is verbal shorthand for someone who reads books and has been known to take a keen interest in art that comes from having a father, Sergei, who is a Ukrainian-born artist.

It is part of the quirky side of being involved in football in this part of the world that if your intellectual appetite extends beyond Twitter and Facebook you are immediately singled out as a bit of a weirdo, an odd-ball, someone whose brains are all inside his head.

You would think, however, that the brighter you are, the more likely you will be to absorb instructions and also be able to think for yourself on the park.

It isn't absolutely necessary that your take on life in general is only able to be summed up in sound bites of 140 characters or less.

Erik wil get the picture for himself soon enough, in any case. Let's call it a culture shock.

Glasgow will be his first experience of being verbally abused in the street by rival fans and told which restaurants he should use and which he should avoid for 'cultural' reasons at the same time. He can think of the city as his finishing school.

Sviatchenko can also be seen as symbolising his new club's absolute faith in Ronny Deila, since his signing is part of an ongoing plan to mobilise a Celtic squad able to qualify for the group stages of the Champions League at the start of next season. And to maintain a gap between Celtic and Rangers in the Premiership after Mark Warburton's side have won promotion from the Championship at the end of the season.

Celtic's performances might have been dismissed as "bang average dross" by their former striker turned television analyst, Chris Sutton, but the display they offered up against Dundee United on Friday was above average, free of dross and filled with plenty of bang as four goals were scored during a night to savour for their supporters.

Deila has the undiluted support of his employers while still dividing the Celtic fans and that backing will only be withdrawn if he fails to win the title, which isn't going to happen.

Aberdeen can now suddenly talk about being title contenders now that the season holds nothing left for them so far as the two cup competitions are concerned, but the decision that they are participants in a title race after all has come too late to be believable.

Celtic will win five in a row and giving Anthony Stokes to Hibs on loan will make no difference to Rangers' title aspirations in the division below.

It was always a wild presumption that Stokes was almost single-handedly going to transform the course of the Championship run-in, irrespective of the fact he has played hardly any football this season.

It's an even greater presumption now that Sunday's draw with Falkirk has left Hibs effectively six points adrift of Rangers if you take the Ibrox side's vastly superior goal difference into account.

The Falkirk manager, Peter Houston, said afterwards the draw suited Rangers and reasoned that his team and Hibs were all about the play-offs, an assessment which is as accurate as it is honest.

So now that we all know where we stand there are a few other things we need to explain to you Erik.

One television company which shares the coverage of live matches in this country has admitted they are now positioning pitchside microphones in a different way so that they don't pick up sectarian chanting and cause offence to the viewing audience.

This is going on at the same time as fans are demanding punishment for the referee, Bobby Madden, who used a four letter word while instructing Celtic's top scorer Leigh Griffiths to go away and stop bothering him last Friday night on Tayside. You'll get used to the double standards, Erik.

Meanwhile, Erik, we've got a piece of legal legislation here known as the Offensive Behaviour at Football Act. It covers sectarian chanting and other forms of anti-social carry on.

But one politician is spearheading a group who want to see the act scrapped because, well just because.

I know I told you the television company were moving their mics to avoid offensive singing, but this is planet Scotland and you'll get used to convoluted thinking in time.

In the meantime, get yourself into the West End and join the cafe society there. And the Art Gallery is open whether it's raining or not. Enjoy.