It was a defeat that had been a long time in coming, but when it finally arrived, it did so emphatically.
Celtic’s unbeaten run of 69 matches without a defeat in Scottish competition was ended by Hearts on Sunday, with the Hoops going down limply 4-0 at Tynecastle.
It had been 585 days previous that they were last beaten, St Johnstone having won 2-1 at McDiarmid Park on May 11, 2016.
The Edinburgh fixture always promised to be a tricky one for Brendan Rodgers’ fatigued side, yet first-half goals from Harry Cochrane, who became the club’s youngest ever league scorer, and Kyle Lafferty set the platform for the hosts to run out comfortable winners.
Just how comfortable will be the fact that most alarms manager Brendan Rodgers, who would have appreciated his team had to lose at some point, as his side find themselves comparatively ailing in the midst of a crazy backlog of fixtures around Christmas.
Celtic’s standards are, of course, higher than any other side in Scottish football, but to reach half-time with a mere two efforts at goal and not a single one on target would have worried any of the Premierships’ 12 managers.
Things barely improved in a muddled second half, though at least Jon McLaughlin was asked to work amid a flurry of wayward efforts that were of more danger to the fans in the upper levels of the stand than the goal itself.
There has been a sense that Celtic have been hanging on to their undefeated run by a thread for several weeks now. It took a hotly debated penalty in Motherwell to prevent them sliding to defeat at Fir Park at the end of November and a last-gasp goal-line clearance to prevent Hibs stealing back from 2-0 down to win at Easter Road when they visited the capital a week ago.
After 18 months of pure success on Scottish soil, there is no precedent to point the reaction the Hoops will give to Sunday’s bruising. When faced with adversity in Europe, Rodgers’ side have typically bounced back well, but never have they looked so utterly sapped of energy and vigour.
Certainly, their want for those to attributes was badly shown up at Tynecastle, where the industry and keenness of the hosts allowed them to control the game. The performance of 16-year-old Cochrane was particularly eye catching, with Celtic bereft of a player who was able to make such an impression on the game as the scorer of the opening goal.
More typical of their performance was the inability of centre-back Dedryck Boyata to find another green-and-white clad man, or Jozo Simunovic’s failure to clear early in the second half, thereby allowing Manuel Milinkovic to coolly round Craig Gordon and poke a third into the goal.
It would be unfair, however, simply to target Celtic’s centre-backs; this was an afternoon upon which nothing worked for Rodgers’ side as their tired minds failed them as much as their legs.
There are little more than three days for the Bhoys to lick their wounds before they play a home fixture against Partick Thistle on Wednesday. Thereafter, a fixture against second-placed Aberdeen follows.
Changes are absolutely necessary in midweek, and if his squad really is as stretched as it appears, Rodgers could not go far wrong to look to Hearts’ example of using youngsters to bring some life back to the team.
Hearts had two 16-year-olds on the field come full-time, and with players like Jack Aitchison and Liam Henderson waiting to break through, Celtic could do worse than give them a chance against Partick.
Certainly, this is a squad in dire need of an injection of energy.
