Celtic's coronation: Graft not craft at Tynecastle as King Kyogo strikes again - but so does VAR

Even the footballing aesthetes must sometimes require to become artisans when the occasion demands.

Some fundamentals never change, though, for Celtic and Ange Postecoglou. And that was what accounted for this merry band partying on the Tynecastle pitch by the conclusion of hostilities – a word used here advisedly – through wrapping up the title with a 2-0 victory on an afternoon when graft overwhelmed craft. Interim Hearts manager Steven Naismith and his players were left bealing over a debatable VAR intervention that reduced them to ten men with a red card for Alex Cochrane at the close of a first period when their vibrancy had Celtic edgy and extended. Doing what champions even in overalls rather than formal attire, Posteocglou’s side eventually elevated themselves in fitting fashion, coming alive in producing a crucial moment with a coterie of their crucial contributors as they have racked up eye-popping 31 wins from 34 games, two of these drawn. Celtic’s coronation effectively crowned courtesy of a regal landmark for a princely performer who has allowed his team so often to enjoy a procession through the cinch Premiership this season in ermine and furs. And who has now taken them to within a Scottish Cup final win of a clean sweep of the Scottish domestic honours.

Kyogo Furuhashi doesn’t have an orb, but he can sometimes seem to exist in his own orbit. You could have been forgiven for thinking that trampolines were involved in how Celtic’s were able to spring into attack when Callum McGregor set himself in space in the middle of the pitch in the 67th minute. That was the trigger for Reo Hatate to burst forward down the right channel and receive the perfect chipped ball he then clipped across the face of goal. As he delivered, Furuhashi was able to do so in a fashion that was an absolute carbon copy of so many of the strikes that have taken him to the 30-goal tally for this campaign, and 50 overall since his £4.7million from Vissel Kobe in July 2021.

The little frontman has the biggest of hearts in putting himself in harm’s way, as he did clattering with keeper Zander Clark, but was still able to neatly nudge the ball into the far corner. In the process, he sustained an injury to a shoulder that has troubled him in the past to almost immediately force him off. Yet, what so regularly allows Celtic to be destructive, sharply shuttling the ball around with quick movement, is ingrained in the processes of Postecoglou with his players.

Kyogo Furuhashi takes the acclaim of the Celtic support after scoring against Hearts at Tynecastle.

There could be no better illustration of that than Kyogo’s replacement, Oh Hyeon-gyu, combining with fellow substitutes Aaron Mooy and Sead Haksabanovic to fashion a 76th-minute second that was a variation of the first. Except the action area was down the left. Except that the Korean striker ran off his marker to open his foot and delicately guide a drive ball from the Australian wide of the helpless Clark.

The Celtic manager maintained that the two goals “were our football; what we do”. Fact is that so much else across the contest wasn’t though, Postecoglou admitting that over the past month his team had “got tight” with what was at stake. It would do a disservice to Hearts not to recognise, in stonkingly impressive fashion, that was because they gave it tight to their visitors with drive and dig that ensured Celtic were so far removed from the debonair version of themselves regularly witnessed as they have produced fine-dining football to feast on top flight opponents. Hearts absolutely rattled them in a fashion rarely seen across the glittering 21-month Postecoglou era. Indeed, at spells in a breathless first half-hour dominated by the Tynecastle side as they tussled with venom and vigour, Celtic had to go back to basics. Not a phrase that could ordinarily be associated with them. They had to produce not just some desperate defending, but even revert to hopeful hoofs to avert danger. It was not Celtic as we know them but Celtic as they were forced to by hustle and bustle of opponents who appear re-energised by Naismith’s input.

Where this would have led to for Hearts in the final analysis was cast to the wind when Cochrane was cast to the stand by referee Nick Walsh in added time of the first period, in what appeared another case of VAR meddling when none was required. Maybe the fact that Willie Collum was the operative for the technology was purely coincidental. And then again, as an official who always seems partial to a red card incident, maybe it wasn’t. A turn of events that felt as if it was going to cause convulsions across the Gorgie ground to produce a bile overload, there is no question over the Hearts defender having tugged Daizen Maeda to the ground as he hared on to a through ball. It was cynical and Walsh seemed to produce the deserved sanction when he waved a yellow in the face of the Englishman.

A short delay later and he had been advised to take a look on his monitor for a possible red card offence that amounted to Cochrane having denied an obvious goalscoring opportunity. As Maeda did not have the ball under control and Kye Rowles appeared to be darting across to cover, it seemed a stretch to adjudge there as anything obvious about the Celtic attacker having a clear effort on goal. Moreover, Walsh’s initial assessment could not be considered to represent a clear and obvious error … understood to be the threshold for a VAR intervention. That said, Walsh wasn’t forced to change his mind on the colour of card he felt Cochrane merited, as he did with a second look that Collum encouraged. The use of the system feels as clear as mud now. Even as Celtic transparently have become a team with a mighty stranglehold on the Scottish game.