I appreciate that Scott Brown will look to Sunday’s game against Rangers and see it as a game that stands alone. You can’t really allow your emotions to get the better of you in a fixture like this.

But at the same time, I also have no doubt that in the dressing room before the players get ready to head up the tunnel that Brown will offer a reminder of one or two things that happened when Celtic lost to Rangers at Ibrox back in December.

Celtic were rotten that day.

Brown himself did not have the best of games.

And I suspect that the feeling of having let people down and ultimately let themselves down, something that has happened so rarely in recent seasons, is something that will be in the minds of the players this weekend. It is something that they will feel that they want to put right.

It was one of the most lacklustre performances in recent memory from Celtic, certainly in a domestic context, but I fully expect that it will be a different Celtic who turn up on Sunday.

They are at home, they have a ten point lead going into the game and a win in this one would really enable them to really look at getting over the finish line.

But for all that Celtic are going into the game with a very comfortable cushion, I just don’t know how much that really comes into play when you are preparing yourself for the match itself. It’s one thing to know that it is there but when it really comes into play is when the game plays out.

I don’t think either team will be overly concentrating on it but if Celtic score the first goal then that is where it starts to kick in. It is the prospect of going a goal down in the game that the mental effect could start to play on the minds of the Rangers players. That is when you start to become very aware of the consequences of losing the game.

That is when you are thinking to yourself that is feels like an awful long way back.

And for all that Rangers were well worth their win back in December, I think they failed to really make that result count.

It is one thing to go out and take the three points but when you slip up in the immediate aftermath of it then it undermines the achievement.

I also think that Celtic have been pretty consistent since the turn of the year which gives you a fair bit of momentum but it also leads to a considerable confidence within the side.

That does have an influence going into the game and it also helps that there are players there now who are capable of coming in and making a difference.

Tom Rogic has been sidelined since January when he was injured playing for Australia in the Asian Cup but even if he makes the bench on Sunday then you know that there is a player there who can come on and make something out of nothing.

There are also options up front that just weren’t there in December. Odsonne Edouard is back and fit and Oliver Burke and Timothy Weah add another dimension to the decisions that Neil Lennon has got to make.

There are options there for him.

And, of course, this is a big day for him too.

He’ll be thinking that the most important thing is to make sure he wins the game and he won’t be too distracted by anything else but he will also know that he can send out a message by how his team go about it.

It is as big an afternoon for the players as it is for Lennon.