Hearts v Celtic – A game to relish for Brendan, his players and Celtic supporters

Morning all, hope you all enjoyed your extra hour in bed with the clocks going back in the wee small hours of the morning.

But when it comes to Celtic,  we certainly can’t afford to relax as this lunchtime will see us facing our biggest challenge of the season as we take on league leaders Hearts at Tynecastle looking to narrow their lead to two points with a decent performance and a win victory.

It’s fair to say that we’ve been under par thus far this campaign, even in its infancy, but after a decent fine on Thursday night we can head to the capital with optimism. We don’t have our injury problems to seek, with Alistair Johnston, Cameron Carter Vickers and Kelechi Iheanacho all out, and possibly Daizen Maeda, but we should still have more than enough to win the game.

It’s Hearts at Tynecastle, not Barca at the Camp Nou, a game that we are more than capable of winning, we are the champions after all, so let’s show that today. It’s a challenge we should all be relishing, the manager, the players and the supporters, this is what football is all about.

Whatever the final result later today, Hearts will still be top, but we want that to be a two point lead and not eight or five. It’s more than a realistic expectation.

The thing about that win over SK Sturm Graz on Thursday night was that it was one of the few big ‘must win’ games that Celtic have actually won in 2025. We got past Young Boys in the Champions League with a late own goal then lost the tie against Bayern Munich despite playing brilliantly at the Allianz Arena.

We have failed to beat a bang average theRangers in 2025 and have one more shot at that next weekend.  Then there was the Scottish Cup Final calamity against a poor Aberdeen team before the costly embarrassment against Kairat Almaty and then taking one point from six in the two opening games of the Europa League when six could have been won – did we ever hear from UEFA why that goal was disallowed against Sporting Braga?

Terrible performances, hard luck stories and the glorious failures but they all created a worrying trend that was finally broken on Thursday night. Celtic can take that into today and the other crucial upcoming games and that will help to lift the cloud that has been hanging over the club in recent months where the supporters have been unhappy – and with good cause.

A Celtic win today will seem significant and not just because we’d have narrowed the gap. Today we head to Tynecastle with a spring in our step for the first time in a while. 2025 has certainly been a challenging year for Celtic but we can end it on a high with real momentum the prize today as we eye the three points by bursting another bubble, just like we did to Aberdeen this time last year.

Let’s do it Celtic.

COYBIG!