One of the most revealing things about yesterday was what happened afterwards. It was instructive to go over and look at the Ibrox fan forums and see what they were saying about the performance, the result and the way the weekend had unfolded.

The thing that became obvious almost immediately was just how fragile their confidence really is.

They can wear confidence for a while when things are going well. They can convince themselves that something has changed, that momentum has shifted, that the latest manager or the latest result represents the beginning of something. But the first proper knock they take, it collapses like a house of cards.

Nobody over there really believes they are equipped to win this league.

Listen, that does not mean they will not win it. We have a long way to go. The lead is four points. It is nothing. This is only October, and we know that this Celtic side is vulnerable in ways which are distressing and, at times, shocking.

They beat us comfortably twice in a row because they are capable of raising their game against us in a way they sometimes seem incapable of doing against other clubs in this league. That is a psychological problem for them.

But our own vulnerabilities are real too, so we cannot take anything for granted. Things in our own house are not as they should be. This Celtic side remains capable of making life unnecessarily difficult for itself, and there are deeper problems around the club which one excellent performance does not magically erase.

But there is still an important difference.

As Celtic supporters, we have been over the course with this team. We have seen it respond to adversity. We saw it at the end of last season. When complacency disappears, when the pressure is absolute and when there is nowhere left to go except straight through the fire, this team has shown that it can brace itself and do exactly that.

They can call us flat-track bullies if they like. There is even some truth in it. All of us want to see a Celtic side which is credible in Europe as well as dominant here at home. All of us are right to worry about just how ill-equipped we sometimes appear to be for the bigger job.

But at the back of our minds, I think most Celtic supporters still expect this team to find a way domestically more weeks than not. We expect to win more games than we lose. We expect to put a very high points total on the board, and we expect that if we do that, it will probably be enough.

Across the city, the psychology feels entirely different.

In spite of all the hype that has surrounded their team, they are out of Europe entirely. They may have reached Hampden for a League Cup semi-final, but there is no guarantee they leave it with a place in the final, never mind with a trophy.

And even that trophy would be small consolation if they watched Celtic pull away and win another championship. Their supporters are always waiting for the other shoe to drop. That is the part which interests me, because deep down, their confidence has been shattered by years and years of this.

Their forums remain angry places, full of bitterness, rage and the fear and loathing I talk about so often. But it is still anger. It is not apathy yet.

And there is a massive difference between those two things.

Anger still means you care. Anger still means you are emotionally invested. Anger still means you believe things could be different, and that somebody, somewhere, is preventing that better future from happening.

That resignation, that sense of never quite being able to make it, can weight more heavily on clubs than anything.

If you want a glimpse of where the Ibrox club could eventually end up, that is where I think the real danger lies.

I have always thought of football clubs as existing within a kind of hierarchy. You can argue about exactly where the boundaries are but I believe it’s broadly like this: elite clubs, giants, great clubs, influential clubs, historic clubs.

But somewhere much further down that ladder comes a very different category.

A club with history.

And that distinction matters. A historic club still carries expectation. A historic club still believes that its past is connected to its present and its future. A club with history is something else entirely. It is a club whose greatest relevance exists in the rear-view mirror.

A club once known for being a winner. A club people talk about in the past tense.

How long before that is the Ibrox club?

Long before their supporters ever consciously accept that status, the anger would have to begin turning into something much worse: resignation, disengagement, apathy. That is what really takes you from being a historic club to merely being a club with history.

And once that shift happens, reversing it is extraordinarily difficult.

They are very good at creating a siege mentality over there. They are very good at convincing themselves that the world is against them and that Celtic, in particular, somehow wields enormous influence over Scottish football.

But even that mentality contains a danger.

Because if you convince yourself that your biggest rival is not simply better than you on the pitch, but somehow all-powerful off it as well, then where does that belief eventually lead? If you tell yourself often enough that you cannot win because the whole game is stacked against you, how long before you begin to wonder why you are bothering to play it at all?

How long before you still love the club, still retain affection for the institution, but stop investing the same time, energy and emotional commitment in following it?

That is the journey from anger to a kind of apathy far worse than ours.

And the stench of defeatism on those forums is poisonous in a way the anger itself is not.

The anger still has life in it. The defeatism is what should worry them.

Because I think that defeatism now seeps through that club far more deeply than they would ever admit. Yesterday struck another blow against their confidence in themselves.

Now it is up to Celtic to exploit that ruthlessly.

Because I am going to be honest.

I like them angry. But I want them crushed.

I like the fact that they can still build a siege mentality because siege mentalities require belief. What I want Celtic to do over the next year, the next two years, the next five years, is keep winning until that belief begins to crack.

Until every new manager is greeted with less excitement. Until every new signing produces less expectation. Until every supposed revival is met not with certainty, but with a shrug. Until the anger burns itself out.

That is when a historic club starts becoming merely a club with history.

Yesterday does not get us there. Not even close.

But weekends like this matter.

Because every time Celtic pushes ahead, every time another burst of Ibrox optimism ends in disappointment, every time their supporters convince themselves that this time everything has changed only to discover that it has not, another little piece of belief disappears.

And if Celtic keeps pushing hard enough, keeps winning enough and keeps crushing those moments of revival, eventually the emotion changes.

The fear remains. The loathing remains.

That is how we want it.

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