Celtic 1
Hearts 0

WHEN the relentless clamour had subsided and the unbearable tension drained away, the non-aligned observers of last night's Premierleague championship decider were left to reflect on an occasion that was more an onerous duty than an example of performance art.
7 Wonders

The winning goal from John Hartson, on the day he turned 31, was partly to blame, taking Celtic into an untypical uncertainty and giving Hearts an initiative they maintained for virtually the rest of the match. But, having been in control for all but a few minutes, the Tynecastle side proved incapable of exploiting their advantages, their head coach, Valdas Ivanauskas, sent to the stand by referee Dougie McDonald ten minutes from the end.

There are innumerable less exhilarating ways to celebrate a birthday than by scoring the goal that gives your team the lead in a match of such significance. Hartson, long renowned as a player who knows a great deal about making the best of things, clearly found the opportunity irresistible. But the goal, it must be said, was something of a curiosity and, from a Hearts perspective, one that came far too easily to the home side.

A long kick from goalkeeper Artur Boruc was headed by Maciej Zurawski on to the right foot of Hartson, but the big striker would have been every inch of 35 yards from goal when he hit the volley. The ball then bounced, rather than hurtled, over the line as Craig Gordon appeared to be uncharacteristically slow to calculate the flight of the shot and to get down to his right to make the save.

It was the kind of set-back that often defuses visitors to Celtic Park to the point of lifelessness, but Hearts, perhaps still imbued with the spirit which had brought them such distinction at Hampden Park three days before, spent long periods thereafter in the ascendancy, even if there was for much of that time a pronounced absence of a serious threat.

Indeed, it was not difficult to form the impression that Celtic had bamboozled themselves with the earliness of their goal, their play suddenly suffused with the indecisiveness of a team who are uncertain of their priorities.

It is not an uncommon phenomenon for players within touching distance of the most glittering prize to fall under the influence of an anxiety to which they have seemed immune for almost an entire season.

Celtic's imprecision in the pass and their tendency to make wrong choices when playing the ball from defensive areas towards the Hearts half of the field had the effect of marginalising players on whom they would normally be reliant to damage their opponents. Shaun Maloney and Shunsuke Nakamura, for almost all of the first half, were the most notable victims.

Hearts' advantage in possession and territory, however, was not exploited as ruthlessly as it had been in the cup semi-final with Hibs, due largely to the resoluteness of the home defenders.

For all the strides taken in the right direction by the forceful Paul Hartley, Deividas Cesnauskis and Julien Brellier from midfield, Edgaras Jankauskas and Roman Bednar in attack were, in the main, subdued by Bobo Balde and Stephen McManus.

Bednar did manage to escape into space following a free kick from Robbie Neilson on the right and, when the ball was knocked forward to him, the Czech forward hit his shot left-footed on the turn and would have slipped inside Boruc's left-hand post had not the goalkeeper dived quickly to tip the ball wide.

On one of Celtic's few skirmishes upfield before the interval, Zurawski might have inflicted potentially irreparable damage as he chased a header down from Hartson, but Gordon was off his line quickly enough to smother the ball at the feet of the striker.

Strachan waited until the 58th minute before conceding that Celtic required some kind of driving force through the midfield and sent on Stephen Pearson in place of Nakamura.

Ivanauskas had already declared his dissatisfaction with his team's attempts at penetration by removing Jankauskas and replacing him with Michal Pospisil and, soon after, would press top scorer Rudi Skacel - a mildly surprising omission from the starting line-up - into service in place of Mikoliunas.

This would have disappointed the little Lithuanian for the fact that, only a short time before, he had played the pass of the night, a through ball along the inside-right channel to Bednar, releasing the striker into the box. His low shot, perfectly placed towards the far corner, would have found its target but for another piece of good work from Boruc, the goalkeeper leaping and stretching to his right to push the ball wide.

The muscular Pole had to repeat the feat soon after, this time from Skacel on the left, the Czech midfielder having carried the ball on a powerful run into the penalty area. Boruc this time knocked the ball out to his left, where it was picked up by Cesnauskis, but his low cross was charged down by the outstretched right foot of the alert and quick Mark Wilson, the Celtic left-back.

By the time Dion Dublin came off the bench to relieve Hartson in attack, Celtic appeared to have been beset by a raggedness that testified to the surreal nature of the occasion. The uninformed observer would have thought that Hearts were pushing for the title, rather than second place.

In these circumstances, aesthetic satisfaction is a rarity, unlike the commonplace that is the kind of loss of equability that overtook Ivanauskas ten minutes from the end and resulted in his banishment from the touchline.

Celtic: Boruc, Telfer, Balde, McManus, Wilson, Nakamura (Pearson 58), Petrov, Lennon, Maloney (McGeady 82), Zurawski, Hartson (Dublin 69). Subs not used: Marshall, Thompson, Varga, Wallace.

Hearts: Gordon, Neilson, Webster, Berra, Fyssas, Cesnauskis, Hartley, Brellier (Elliot 85), Mikoliunas (Skacel 62), Bednar, Jankauskas (Pospisil 54). Subs not used: Banks, Tall, Aguiar, Petras.

Taken from the Scotsman