Twenty Six Points? You're Having A Laugh

It's laughable that Hearts have won the Championship in March.

It's a tribute to efficient organisation off the park, and sound management on it, that Robbie Nielson's side can now have a title-winning party when they play Queen of the South at Tynecastle on Saturday.

But it's laughable that they claimed the automatic promotion place which takes them up to the Premier League before the players' kids have had time to roll their Easter eggs.

And it underlines the farcical mis-handling of Rangers' season that Hearts had a twenty-six point lead over them at the point at which they were crowned title winners.

Twenty-six points.

Roll it around the tongue. Let it circulate in the mind.

Twenty-six points.

If you want to illustrate the embarrassingly inept nature of Rangers' season then that figure on its own should be enough to sum up a disastrous stagger from one poor result to another.

It would have been bad enough for the Ibrox club to finish behind Hearts with a single point deficit, given the budgetary differences between them.

But to be twenty-six points behind them, with the possibility of an even greater margin being created by Hearts before the season is over, should be considered a ludicrous state of affairs.

The clubs will meet again in April and then the month after, and Neilson's team could have a major say in how many play-off ties Rangers have to play at the end of the season.

Hibs handed Hearts the title by losing to Rangers on Sunday at Easter Road. Hearts could return the favour by denying Stuart McCall's side sufficient points to overhaul Hibs and finish second in the table.

That would then mean Rangers' nerve was tested on a home and away basis against another side before they got the chance to confront Hibs for the right to go up to the major league.

The only thing which should prevent anyone from going out on a limb and stating that is precisely what will happen is the game's enduring ability to defy prediction.

Who, for example, saw Rangers' win at Easter Road coming after they had drawn a handful of matches against sides beneath them in the table prior to pitching up in Edinburgh?

The same players who dominated Hibs had previously been lucky to escape with nothing more severe than a four-nil beating the last time they were on that patch.

But now the psychological boot could be on the other foot.

A seed of doubt has been planted in the minds of the previously confident Hibs players and management that they might not survive a home and away play-off against Rangers if that is how the cards fall.

Meanwhile the championship crop has failed at Pittodrie.

Any glimmer of hope that Derek McInnes' side could usurp Celtic and win the Premier League was extinguished when they sold the jerseys against Dundee at the weekend.

The one-all draw at Dens Park was Celtic's cue to dismantle Dundee United in a single half and then play out the second forty five minutes like a team who were heartily fed up looking at the side they were playing for a fourth, consecutive time.

It would take an extraordinarily pessimistic Celtic supporter, or a cock-eyed optimist from the Granite City, to visualise a set of circumstances which could conspire to deny Ronny Deila the league title in his first season as manager.

But at least the subject of Celtic and the Treble still allows for the possibility of the game's inexplicably inconsistent side to come to the fore.

There's no reason to suggest with any degree of certainty that Inverness Caley Thistle could eliminate Celtic from the Scottish Cup at the semi-final stage.

Other than to say it was the Highlanders who cost Celtic the league title four years ago by beating them 3- 2 on the night Neil Lennon took his managerial frustration out on a crate of energy drinks that were booted up into the air.

And history tells us Hibs, who last won the Scottish Cup 113 years ago, would hardly have the odds in their favour if Celtic did make the final and found Alan Stubbs' side standing between them and the trophy on May 30.

But what sustains interest between now and the end of the season, whether it's the play-offs or what booby-traps might lie on the road to the Treble for Celtic, is football's refusal to accept that there is such a thing as a racing certainty.

Otherwise we'd be bringing the big tent down and admitting the circus was over without waiting for the remainder of the fixtures to be played.