ONE of the unbreakable rules of football coverage in Scotland is - if the Blue Bigot Brother gets all the column inches for a few days, then, the Green Bigot Brother has to get his turn immediately afterwards.
So, even before Mark Warburton had thrown all his toys out of his pram and established a new British All-Comers dummy spitting record, apropos the Rugby Park artificial surface, the backlash from across the city had started.
Cue James Forrest, who has refused a new contract and is heading for pasgtures new when his Celtic contract expires. Given his recent form, can I wish Forrest's agent all the best - because, to be frank, his recent form will make him difficult to move-on to a worthwhile club.
When Forrest first exploded onto the scene, he excited me. He was, even then, no Jinky Johnstone, but, I thought: "This kid could go places". I accept, he has had more than his fair share of injuries, but, James Forrest has not "trained on" to make the switch from promising boy to established star - and, sadly, this has been a long-standing problem with Scottish football in general, and the Old Firm (deny it all you like, but, the Rangers Tribute Act is still, in media terms, one half of an Old Firm) in particular.
My first Old Firm game was at Celtic Park, on 8 September, 1962. Rangers won 1-0, a very young Willie Henderson, who had hitherto been anonymous, switched to the left wing to score an 83rd minute winner. Weeks later he won the first of his eventual 29 Scotland caps, a total which would surely have been greater but for a bizarre injury - a troublesome bunion.
Henderson "trained on", Jim Forrest, who scored two goals in a comprehensive 3-0 Rangers win at Celtic Park on 10 August, 1963 - didn't. The young Forrest scored goals for fun, he had strength, pace, a great eye for a goal, but, he failed to build on his early promise, was off-loaded in the wake of the Berwick disaster and accrued a mere five Scotland caps. But, for Rangers, Forrest scored goals at the rate of 0.88 goals per game - and that is class in any language.
Speaking of Berwick, that disaster hastened Sandy Jardine's breakthrough at Ibrox, but, he had his dark spells before finally getting recognition as one half of arguably Scotland's greatest full back partnership, with Danny McGrain.
There's another player to break into the Celtic team early, suffer injury, but battle back to achieve legend status. But, for every McGrain, Hay or Dalglish who became a legend - Celtic have had two or three like a Victor Davidson or a Paul Wilson, or, more-recently, a Mark Burchill, or a Craig Beattie, who didn't train-on to amass a double-digit tally of caps.
At Ibrox, it has been even worse. Since "The Souness Revolution" it might be said, only Barry Ferguson has come through the ranks from age 16 to become a Scotland regular. Others, Charlie Miller and Charlie Adam flattered to deceive, while others such as Greg Wylde were probably over-hyped, maybe began to believe their own publicity and faded.
I accept, the absolute NEED for these two clubs to win every game tells against young players. OF Managers are always loath to throw youngsters into the cauldrons of such games. For sure, if you get into either first team at an early age, the Under-21 caps will follow, and, the two clubs' cheer-leaders in the media will immediately start a "cap them now" campaign.
But, since the Souness days, increasingly, young home-bred Scottish talent has not been properly nurtured at what should be our two top clubs - the clubs with which they are most-likely to gain the experience of facing quality European sides, so-vital in the international side. And, this has hit Scotland, perhaps even more than it has hit the two clubs.
For the sake of the international team - we really MUST come up with a development system which is unlikely to be compromised by the "must win" needs of our top clubs. A system which allows the good young players we have to "train-on" to become established internationalists.
Our club game isn't doing this job, we have to amend our game to make this happen. And to help the likes of James Forrest to really develop better.
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