By fans just like favourite Burns

you are hurting just now, be in his shoes for an hour today. I don’t care what anybody feels like at this moment, no one fees as bad as him.”

And Strachan has also insisted that the growing presence of Rangers has given Lennon problems that the Parkhead side haven’t had to deal with in any time over the last decade or so.

Such a theory is underlined by the fact that Celtic, in theory, could still eclipse their points tally from Brendan Rodgers’ second season while there is also the chance that this term, for all its faults, could still end with a higher points tally than from three of the nine-in-a-row years.

“Rangers have been terrific. They’ve not just shown it in the league they’ve shown it in Europe. They have got better and better,” said Strachan. “No one in the previous eight years had ever had to deal with a side as good as them – nowhere near the Rangers teams we are seeing just now.

“They were bang average and are now completely different. When it settles down, there will be a time to look back over the past 20 years at Celtic and see how we got to there and now. He’s up there with the top people that’s ever played for the club. He’s managed the club, coached the club, he’s been everything.”

Strachan is confident that after a period out of football that Lennon will look to get back to it.

“I hope he’s not lost to the game,” he said. “Where do you go after this? It’s not easy leaving the Celtic job. It’s hard to see what he’ll want to do with himself.

“But the strange thing is that after a period of time, you miss the madness of the West of Scotland.”