They looked so different. They looked so much the same.

Impervious in the first-half, a little chastened but ultimately triumphant in the second.

Flags and looming fines and early leads, wilting defences and crazy, see-sawing European nights; Celtic Park has lived through it all before.

But even then this was quite something to see. A yawning lead, a terrifying stare into the dark abyss and then, suddenly an almighty regroup and the night ended as it had begun. It was just the stuff in between times that might require that some observers slept with the light on last night.

‘Let’s go all in,’ read the giant banner, depicting Brendan Rodgers Don-style, with a mighty pile of poker chips stashed in front of him. They did. By the time the half-time whistle sounded, shrill underneath a glorious summer sky, Celtic’s game face had spooked their visitors into surrendering their nerve at the door.

Problem was, this Hapoel Be’er Sheva side sensed where the bodies are buried at Celtic Park. Calling to mind the graveyard of expectations that was Malmo last season, the visitors turned a cocksure Hoops side into a team an antsy bundle of nerves by the time this game had hit the hour mark.

The swagger, the sense of conviction crumbled when they shipped two goals in as many minutes. It seemed like a horror case of deja-vu.

And yet, there was so more to Celtic this time around.

They did not shrink and disappear into the mayhem as Hapoel sensed the fear; they found calm in the storm, they kept their head, they restored their lead. The gloss of the result was lost, perhaps, amidst some of the chaos but at the same time there is a suggestion that there is something so more substantial to this Celtic team than what we have seen in recent campaigns.

While Rodgers has spent and spent well in the transfer market this summer, the real difference is not so much as what he has bought as what he has imbued. There is a belief about Celtic, a sense of conviction.

Celtic Park expected this team to deliver last night.

They were rattled – and rightly so – when they lost the two quick goals. But while this time last season Celtic were lamented for the lack of a backbone in times of adversity, what they showed this time around is that while those frailties may remain, there is courage to cope.

Rodgers, as the picture before a ball was kicked suggested, likes a gamble. And ultimately he trusts his players.

At 3-2 and with the game edging away from Celtic, he turned to his bench and rejigged. On came Nir Bitton, Moussa Dembele -the man who got them here in the first place – and Saidy Janko.

Slowly, they edged back control, faced off their audacious hosts and when Dembele headed home a fourth goal to restore a decent cushion the relief within the stadium was palpable.

By the time Scott Brown – Scott Brown – lashed home a fifth they were dancing once again.

Brown, like Forrest, gives credence to the theory that Rodgers is man capable of teasing gold from straw. Both players have been revitalised and re-energised this season and Celtic reaped the benefits of that resurgence last night.

While guys like Kolo Toure and Scott Sinclair have brought much already to this Hoops side, the ones who came to the fore last night were men who were in danger of fading from sight at the club.

And yet, in that opening period the real godfather amidst the madness of off-field politics and a pulsating football match that provided beautiful theatre to a captive audience, was a familiar name.

Leigh Griffiths did the ordinary this week away from the pitch. On it, he has become Celtic’s go-to man for the extraordinary.

His first, Celtic’s second of the night, was a thing of beauty. The rich tapestry of the move began with the impervious Kolo Toure, brought in Scott Sinclair and James Forrest before Griffiths leaped to power a Larsson-esque header into the net. Before the half-time whistle sounded, he had done it again.

Such was the drama on the pitch that the off-field stuff was relegated to something of a sideshow. Celtic will cop another fine from UEFA – another one on top of the 11 fines they have had since 2007 – for the show of Palestinian flags but the real significance of last night was that they did not raise a flag of the white variety.