Hardly out of October and a promising start to the 2015/16 Scottish Premier League title race has suddenly turned, yet again, predictable.
Aberdeen's early season bluster, eight wins out of eight starts, now seems like a distant memory as Celtic put them to the sword with a comfortable 3-1 win at Parkhead. Some commentators are now happily predicting, this early in the season, that Celtic are well on course to winning their fifth consecutive title. Who would bet against it?
It is, of course, disappointing to be talking as if a Celtic title win is a foregone conclusion but it is now very difficult to see who is going to stop them.
Once more it seems that Scottish Football's predictable and pedestrian offering continues.
Early season, both Aberdeen and Hearts had looked as if they were going to mount a real challenge to Celtic's cosy, though unimpressive and too easy, domination of the Scottish league. Aberdeen with eight out of eight wins and Hearts who started with six straight, looked as if they were the teams equipped to break Celtic's monopoly.
But the wheels have come off Aberdeen's early form and dreadful performances over their last five games, four defeats and a draw including a 5-1 home defeat by an ordinary looking St Johnstone side, seems to have put paid to any title hopes they may have harboured. In Edinburgh, a six game perfect start from Hearts also indicated something competitive.
But a faltering Tynecastle side have slipped six points behind the leaders, though a 4-0 away win against Partick Thistle mean they overtake Aberdeen into second place.
Nevertheless, with 13 games on the board it is looking more than likely that Aberdeen and Hearts will be no more than also rans in another mundane and predictable title race.
The title is now Celtic's to throw away.
Some will blame the decline of the modern Scottish game on the demotion of Rangers, though commentators had hoped that this move would generate extra competition from the other clubs. Some believed that clubs like Aberdeen, Dundee United, Hearts and the like would produce more competitive sides and challenge Celtic's domination of the league.
The opposite has happened. A Celtic side who struggle in Europe, look home champions in waiting and the Scottish domestic product looks increasingly jaded and uninspiring.
True, Rangers look like returning to the top flight after this season. They have taken the Championship by storm this season after the appointment of Mark Warburton. But, will the return of Rangers to the Premier League revitalise the competition and turn the Scottish Premier League into a readily saleable brand? I would love to be proved wrong but I doubt it, at best, I fear, it will prove too little too late.
