Celtic reaction: Weirdly missing from top of one table; absence makes fans fonder towards Turnbull; Green Brigade navel-gazing with who they choose to honour

Goals are flowing for Celtic again, with 10 in their past three games. But one position remains elusive even with those returns.

Weirdly missing from top of one table

It seemed all about the goals as Celtic extended their league lead to six points with a 4-0 thumping of Ross County - the club’s biggest home league win since August. Giorgos Giakoumakis bagged his second hat-trick in as many appearances at the club’s home to take his tally to nine goals in only seven games, and 11 since the turn of the year. Daizen Maeda’s goal means he has six in 14 outings. Celtic are the highest scorers in the cinch Premiership, with a 69 total from their 31 games.

All of which makes one anomaly unprecedented. In the list of top league scorers, Celtic do not have a player in the leading five. Four of Giakoumakis’ goals of late have come in the Scottish Cup, giving him eight in the league. The sixth-placed player and best-placed from Celtic is winger Liel Abada on nine. Now, that situation might change in the closing two months of the season with current top of the pile, Ross County’s Regan Charles-Cook, only five ahead on the 13 mark. But never so late into a top flight campaign wherein Celtic are excelling - they are now 25 league games unbeaten in a 31-match domestic run with loss - have they been missing from the leading contenders for the golden boot.

The fact could be considered merely a quirk of fate. Kyogo Furuhashi was up there across the first half of the season with eight league goals from 14 appearances, only to be sidelined for the past three months with a hamstring issue. And Giakoumakis surely would have been but for the first half of the campaign largely proving a write-off for him through injury problems. Notably, in