Job Done - Next.

MISSION accomplished: Celtic went to Belfast, killed the tie and got out with minimum fuss and drama, a good night all round - next please.

Neil Lennon has to be happy, that much was obvious from his on-screen demeanour with the BBC's men; he said all the right things, smiled a lot and was off. Those Rangers fans to whom he is Beelzebub incarnate must have been beelin.

Matches such as that against Cliftonville have been potential banana skins for Lennon's Celtic. The players know they are the best squad in Scotland, just occasionally, they have gone into games perhaps convinced they only had to turn-up to win, and then struggled. On Wednesday night it seemed the Gaffer had won his battle with that attitude, at no time did it look as if Celtic were about to fall over.

To sum up, a bunch of professionals did a professional job and put a bunch of willing but limited part-timers in their place.

TONIGHT is the big test for Scottish football. Can St Johnstone and Hibs emerge from their Scandinavian sorties still in contention to remain alive in the Europa League?

Once upon a time, two Scottish clubs heading off to Norway and Sweden would not have concerned the body of the kirk back home - at the very least away draws, putting the Scottish teams in the driving seat for the home second legs would be what was expected, and delivered. Alas, while our Scandinavian neighbours invested in indoor training facilities, put the emphasis on touch and skill, we went down the road of power at the expense of finesse.

Ash parks in the city, virtual ploughed fields in the country had been good enough for oor faithers and grand-faithers, as had been playin wi a tanner ba in the street. This had made Scotland ra greatest wee fitba nation God ever pit braith intae - why change.

Of course, we hadn't been the greatest wee fitba nation since 1928, when Uruguay won the Olympic Games football, as a prelude to winning the 1930 World Cup; ploughing through mud or dodging stones and broken glass on ash parks merely gave us a nation of runners, who struggled to trap a bag of cement.

The fans have cottoned-on to our limitations, the blazers: they are too-busy looking after Number One on the executive floor at Hampden, so, we fear for our two representatives tonight.

It doesn't help that the Scandinavian countries are almost mid-way through their season and will be fully tuned-up, while our boys, in the eight weeks or so since last season ended, have presumably forgotten what shape the ball is, what those two funny cages with nets at either end of the park are for, and how to manipulate that strange air-filled, spherical object into said cages.

Cliftonville were the willing part-timers last night. Tonight, I feat that status falls on Saints and Hibs: good luck lads.

DAVIE White died yesterday. He will go down in history as the first Rangers manager to have the job for a full season or more, and never win a trophy. He was, when appointed, dismissed as "The Boy David", by Willie Waddell - the man who got his job funnily enough.

He lost it because, the board, panicked by Waddell's newspaper vitriol towards White and the way it stirred-up the fans, lost their nerve.

A generation later, when things were going badly for Paul Le Guen, SDM panicked too, sacked the boss and, I feel, harmed Rangers.

White deserved better treatment than he got, he was a good manager, unfortunately, Celtic at the time were in the hands of a managerial genius.

White departed, licked his wounds, but, even last season, in the Third Division, the now 80-year-old White was still turning up at Ibrox to support the team he had followed all his life.

That is the sort of dedication which makes Celtic and Rangers so special in Scotland and gives them the edge over all the rest. It's frightening.