There are some players who simply come alive in the Old Firm fixture. And there are those who wilt.
Former Rangers manager Graeme Souness had said in the build-up to this game that he would relish the chance to go to the home of his club’s bitter rivals with 60,000 Celtic supporters in attendance, and thrive despite having no Rangers fans to back his own side up.
It seems such defiance, and those cut from the sort of cloth that Souness was, are things of a bygone Ibrox era.
In Kyogo Furuhashi, for instance, Celtic have a striker who lives for such occasions. On the day at Celtic Park, Rangers had too many – their own striker in Cyriel Dessers among them - who were swallowed up by it.
Kyogo hit his eighth goal in 15 matches against Rangers to put Celtic two ahead (albeit, with the aid of a terrible starting position from keeper Jack Butland), had another ruled out before that due to a marginal offside call against Nicolas Kuhn, and was generally a nuisance all day to the ragged Rangers backline.
In contrast, Dessers – who has had a fine start to the season, and had three goals in three league games to his name coming into this compared to Kyogo’s none – fluffed his lines when his big moments arrived.
The Nigerian internationalist had the first big chance of the afternoon, but sclaffed his effort straight at Kasper Schmeichel from the centre of the Celtic box. The offside flag may well have spared his blushes, but the lack of conviction in his finish was a portent of things to come.
When presented with another opening at the start of the second half as Rangers tried to regroup and claw their way back into the contest, or at least make a contest of it, Dessers was again unconvincing.
Paulo Bernardo, who had a fine afternoon filling Matt O’Riley’s boots despite this one moment of slackness, was robbed as he took too long in possession at the edge of his own area. Dessers shaped to shoot, but again passed it straight at Schmeichel, who could have thrown his cap on the attempt if he had been wearing one.
In fairness to Dessers, he wasn’t alone in failing to do himself justice. The performances of the captains on the day also neatly illustrated the stark contrast between the sides.
James Tavernier cost his side the opening goal as he was caught napping at the back post, the home side scoring the sort of goal they always seem to score when up against Rangers.
A cutback from one wing (this time from Alistair Johnston after he got on the end of a clever Bernardo pass in behind) the Rangers full back dozing (this time Tavernier) and the Celtic winger (this time Maeda) coming inside to finish. Or as it is otherwise known, the Liel Abada goal against Borna Barisic.
The Rangers captain looked around and pointed a finger at Mohamed Diomande, but this was on him. The Celtic captain, Callum McGregor, was a picture of composure, and again controlled the midfield area.
The failure to deal with McGregor is another Rangers failing – and perhaps the most fatal one - that manager upon manager has either been unable to address or is seemingly unwilling to.
One of these days, the man in the Rangers dugout may cotton onto the fact that assigning a player to nullify McGregor’s influence on this match might be a good idea. But it was not Philippe Clement, and not on this day. The Celtic skipper has lorded it over whichever combination of Rangers midfielders are put up against him, and it was more of the same here.
It looked as though Diomande would be the one to get in around him early on, as Rangers actually opened the match well with an aggressive starting position, forcing Celtic to give up possession on more than a few occasions.
Before long though, McGregor had wriggled clear, and as soon as Celtic got themselves settled, they started to exploit the huge expanses of space that Rangers were leaving in behind almost at will.
Connor Barron has impressed since his arrival at Rangers from Aberdeen, but he was another who struggled in the heat of the Celtic Park cauldron, and couldn’t make his presence felt in the middle of the park.
It was fitting that the final say on the day went to McGregor then, who capped off his man of the match performance with a stunning third goal to almost rip the roof off of the stadium.
He picked the ball up in acres of space – surprise, surprise – feinted past a couple of token challenges, and rifled the ball from long range past Butland with the aid of a nick off the toe of Dujon Sterling.
He has now surpassed the goal tally he managed in the entirety of last season, with the stunning hit his third such strike of the campaign already.
Compare, and contrast. Celtic are now five points clear of Rangers in the table, and on this evidence, streets ahead in most areas.
