The Old Infirm Are A Gruesome Twosome

Why did the away fans take offence when the Hibs supporters chanted "You're not Rangers any more" before the game at Easter Road on Saturday ?

They surely can't believe the team they watched go down with no survivors in Edinburgh accurately reflects what they believe to be a side worthy of representing their club.

And can I be the first to say "I told you so" when it comes to Ronny Deila-bolical over at Celtic Park. He could be in line to achieve a managerial miracle by becoming the first ever Celtic boss not to win a league title when he didn't have Rangers as a direct competitor.

You wouldn't pull back your curtains to watch Celtic and/or Rangers if they were playing in your back garden.

They'll hype up the meeting of the two clubs as the return of the Old Firm derby when they meet in the League Cup semi-final at Hampden on February 1, but that amounts to a breach of the advertising standards code.

The Old Firm used to stand for legendary players capable of producing epic contests which would have lived long in the memory even without celebration DVD's being produced to make money out of nostalgia.

Now the pair of them have players unworthy of wearing the jerseys and incapable of rising above the depths of mediocrity when they play.

I have a son in law who practically lost the power of speech and entered into a mildly catatonic state whenever Celtic lost a game. He came back from Saturday's goal-less draw with the might of Ross County saying he had been bored throughout and only stayed until the end for ther sake of his wee boy.

Earlier in the day I had witnessed the sight of the Rangers end at Easter Road look like an emergency evacuation had taken place as Hibs scored goal after goal against an Ibrox team who re-defined the word 'Hopeless.'

Withering words and salty sarcasm are all very well, but Celtic and Rangers being useless is actually a catastrophe for the Scottish game.

The renaissance being enjoyed by Hearts and their terrific supporter base, along with a resurgent Aberdeen mounting a serious challenge to Celtic for the Premiership title, is commendable and good to see.

But it doesn't turn on sponsors and television companies in the same way that the gruesome twosome do.

The League Cup only got last minute sponsorship this season because a meeting of a couple of bad lots is better then no meeting at all when it comes to Celtic and Rangers.

The old tribal instincts will kick in when the pair of them come together for their toxic tango at the National Stadium, but if you want a proper football match you'd be better off going to the other semi-final between Aberdeen and Dundee United.

When the Old Firm met seven times in the last season of normality in Scotland the final meeting drew the highest audience figure ever recorded for a televised game North of the border.

That was because the intensity of the madness surrounding the fixture had reached a state where Sky believed they might actually show some shocking spectacle unrivalled in the history of football.

That's what they buy into, and if they can't get it because the two clubs have fallen into disrepair then they sneeze and the game catches a cold.

Rangers are the biggest worry because they've come to a complete full stop as a club.

At the top there's a chairman, David Somers , who is contemptuous of the supporters. At the bottom there's a squad of players who are not going to take Rangers back to anywhere near the position the fans believe they should occupy in the game's grand scheme of things.

Their rivals enjoy good health, financially speaking, but the Celtic support will always be the last to know when there is anything wrong on the park at their club because they inately believe that any criticism of the team is part of a global conspiracy against them.

That will only change when Ronny rotation is finally exposed as the man who was mistakenly put into a job that was too big for him.

In the meantime they'll need to get on with believing that dropping five league points at home to the likes of Hamilton Accies and Ross County, without scoring a single goal in the process, is the media's fault.

I don't remember going five games without scoring, and being subbed on every occasion, like John Guidetti.

And I have absolutely no recollection of defending like Efe Ambrose, who should now be given compassionate leave on match days as an act of mercy.

Meanwhile the reigning Player of the Year, Kris Commons, scorer of thirty-plus goals last season, can't start a game because of his body fat or something.

He'll be off in the transfer window when it opens this week and don't come running to me when the penny finally drops that he was a big miss.

There's a complacency among those who still go to watchCeltic play.

It takes the form of saying "We're the only club who can still win four domestic and European trophies" without stopping to examine what is actually happening in front of their eyes.

The month of February, with cup ties against Rangers and Dundee and a Europa League meeting with Inter Milan, could have a sobering effect on those who still believe the Deila is some kind of Norwegian mystic who brings a special brand of magic to the job of management.

It'll also be the month when we'll find out if the SFA sanction Mike Ashley taking over Rangers by conventional means or whether control of the club passes to other people who'll need to have exceptional wealth to pay for everything needs fixing.

The stark truth is Celtic and Rangers are in a race to see who can drive people away from watching them the quickest.

They have created a mood of disillusionment that is bad for the game, no matter what any supporter of any other club has to say.

And you'll only know how accurate that statement is when you don't have the complaint that television runs the game. It's better for us when they do.