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Saturday 16 May, 12:30
Live on Sky Sports
Celtic Park prepares for a unique title decider
Scottish football has spent four decades trapped inside the same story.
Celtic or Rangers. Rangers or Celtic.
It's been 40 successive league titles shared between Glasgow's two giants. Generations have grown up without witnessing anything different. I have seen most things in football, but this is new territory for 38-year-old me.
Now, one match from the finish line, Hearts stand on the brink of smashing the glass ceiling.
But Celtic are in there pitching due to a run of six straight Premiership wins. That run looked to be ending at Motherwell but due to the most chaotic and controversial moments the Scottish Premiership has seen in years we are now facing this title showdown on Saturday.
Deep into stoppage time, Celtic were handed a 99th-minute penalty that completely reshaped the title race before this final-day showdown at Celtic Park. Was it handball? Was it a header? Even after countless replays, nobody seems entirely certain. The debate will rage for years depending on which side of the divide you stand.
What is certain is this: it has left Scottish football with a finale dripping in tension, history and consequence.
The equation is brutally simple.
Celtic must win to secure a 14th Premiership title in the last 15 seasons and a record-extending 56th top-flight crown overall.
Hearts simply need to avoid defeat. And if they do, they can change history.
Not since Alex Ferguson's Aberdeen in 1984/85 has a non-Old Firm club been crowned champions of Scotland. Hearts now have the chance to end a 40-year monopoly and become Scottish champions for the fifth time.
Every misplaced pass, every VAR check, every roar from the stands will carry the weight of decades. And the world will be watching and betting on it.
The markets still favour Celtic at 4/71.57 on the Betfair Sportsbook to get the job done while Hearts are 5/42.25 to complete one of the great modern Scottish sporting shocks.
Second half goals to flow at Evens
Goals look on the menu based on the market projections with the over 2.5 goals 40/851.47 on the Betfair Sportsbook with the line almost being set at over 3.5 goals which is on offer at 5/42.25.
Those lines look tight enough to me but there is a market which has potential when it comes to goal output.
The final weeks of a campaign are one of my favourite periods for targeting second-half goals, specifically backing there to be more goals scored after the break than before it. You can get Evens on the second half producing more goals than the first with the Betfair Sportsbook.
It's one of those angles that doesn't always look sexy on paper but the psychology of football at this stage of the season creates the perfect storm for late chaos where tactical discipline disappears when games become stretched.
And this game screams late drama when assessing the potential game state, doesn't it?
Back Second Half to produce most goals
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High stakes and hostility make red cards a major player
If recent history is anything to go by in these monster games across Britian, then the officials, fuelled by VAR, are going to feature heavily in the outcome in this final chapter. The man in the middle is Don Robertson, who has been the referee on the last two occasions where Hearts have beaten Celtic.
Robertson comes into this one with a recent thirst for dishing out a red card, sending off three players in his last four Scottish Premiership matches. This includes sending off Hibs' Raphael Sallinger and Felix Passlack in Hearts' dramatic 2-1 win over their great rivals last month.
If you split stakes on a Celtic to be shown a red card at 6/17.00 and Hearts to be shown a red card at 11/26.50, you're effectively taking about 5/23.50 shot a red being flashed with potentially both singles paying out if both teams pick up a red.
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