ANALYSIS
BY MICHAEL GANNON AT MURRAYFIELD FINDLAY, Farquhar, Cameron and co have never seen anything quite like this on their patch.
The speakers blasted out AC/DC before the game and after the whistle the place was charged to levels you just don’t get when chaps with the oddshaped balls are running around Murrayfield.
It took a penalty to get Celtic on their way but Scott Sinclair resisted the temptation to hoof it over the bar to make sure his side will be heading back to football’s home for the Betfred Cup Final.
The scene might have been different but the story was the same as Celtic dominated the rugby field just as they do the football pitches when it comes to the crunch games.
The Scottish fitba’ gods love a wind-up and they were at it again thrusting the home of rugby on the agenda again a few weeks after the SFA voted to stick with Hampden.
Murrayfield didn’t half look the part. Scottish football’s biggest attendance for 29 years, the place was in full bloom and full boom.
Hearts and Celtic were channelling some rugby spirit on the pitch for a while as well. The Jambos were going for the up and unders. Celts did their best to avoid forward passes.
Gorgie skipper Steven MacLean was doing a decent impression of a fierce forward from the Borders. He smashed into Mikael Lustig in the first minute like a big second row going up for a line-out.
He then left poor Eboue Kouassi with odd shaped balls after grabbing the Ivory Coast man’s privates.
Kouassi then got injured and his departure and Sinclair’s introduction gave the Hoops the kick in the nuts they needed.
Murrayfield is used to seeing flying wingers and it was the Celtic wide man and James Forrest on the other flank that started to allow their side to hit the try-line, erm, byline.
Hearts frustrated and created on occasions during the first half but the loss of Steven Naismith inside seven minutes as too big a blow.
MacLean was lucky to still be on the pitch and the green half of the ground would have been fuming if the flag hadn’t gone up to rule out the striker’s cheeky finish from close range.
The Jambos managed to ask a few questions of the Hoops but again they had the answers. Europe might be too stiff a test at times but Rodgers’s men keep acing every exam on home soil.
Sinclair’s opener broke Hearts, Forrest and Ryan Christie finished off the Jam Tarts and it could have ended up a rugby score. Murrayfield might have been new but Celtic made it business as usual.