It looks like we might be getting Robbie Keane at Celtic Park after all – just in maroon. Tony Bloom and Hearts have entered the chat…

Well, well, well…

It looks like we might be getting Robbie Keane at Celtic Park after all.

Just not in the dugout we’d been arguing about for the last fortnight.

He could be in the other dugout.

In maroon.

Sat where Derek “Siege Mentality” McInnes was sat twelve hours ago.

According to the Scottish Sun this afternoon, Tony Bloom and the Gorgie men have parked their tanks on Keane’s lawn.

The Sun has Keane installed as joint-favourite for the Tynecastle gig alongside Dutch duo Rene Hake and Dick Schreuder.

BetVictor have him pencilled in as third favourite.

Either way, he’s on the shortlist.

The same Robbie Keane that the Green Brigade chased away from Celtic Park with a statement, a banner, and a fresh coat of graffiti on the brickwork at Janefield Street.

The same Robbie Keane that the Bhoys Celtic ultras told to “f*** off” in big bold letters on London Road.

Yes, the same Robbie Keane that Hugh “Nostradamus” Keevins told us Dermot Desmond had backed away from out of respect for the supporters.

Yeah.

About that.

Let me get this straight.

The Green Brigade kicked off.

The Bhoys Celtic kicked off.

The supporters groups list kicked off.

Twitter, the SMSM, and every Celtic fan with a phone and an opinion kicked off.

And what could it ultimately going to deliver??

Robbie Keane.

In Glasgow.

Twice a season.

In the wrong colour shirt.

You couldn’t write it.

Although I just did.

Of course this was always how it was going to play out.

I told you this on Sunday in the Keevins demolition piece.

I told you again yesterday in the McInnes piece.

Tony Bloom was never going to settle for some recycled Del boy replacement out of the Aberdeen academy of mediocrity.

Bloom is a Premier League brain who has just noticed the door at Tynecastle has swung open.

He’s going to swing for the fences.

And right now, Keane is one of the fences he’s swinging at.

You see, the curious thing about all of this is the timing.

Less than ten days ago, the Irish Independent told us Robbie Keane had been “earmarked” as a future Celtic manager.

A “strong chance” he becomes the boss “in the future”.

This morning, the Sun is telling us he’s in the running for Hearts.

These two things are not unrelated.

Make no mistake about that.

Because if Bloom can land Keane at Tynecastle, the “future Celtic manager” line quietly walks itself back over the next twelve months.

Bloom will have done the puppet master golfer in Barbados a giant favour by accident.

And Bloom doesn’t do anything by accident.

Now let me paint you the picture the Green Brigade absolutely did not see coming when they were spraying that wall.

Saturday, late October, 2026.

Hearts at Celtic Park.

The Robbie Keane Hearts.

Stood in the away dugout where the protests were meant to keep him from ever standing.

Looking up at the very brickwork where the graffiti went on.

Reading the very banners that were unfurled to stop him coming to our city.

Indeed.

Categorically.

Here’s the bit that’s going to wind a lot of people up.

Robbie Keane managing Hearts is exactly the gig he should be at.

A mid-table Scottish club with European football and a chairman who actually has a plan.

Not a 56-time champion sitting on £80m in the bank.

I said it ten days ago, and I’ll say it again now.

He is not good enough to manage Celtic.

He never was.

But he is absolutely good enough to scrap it out at Tynecastle with the rest of the second-tier coaches in Scottish football.

Give me a f*****g break – the Green Brigade spent three weeks spraying walls and hanging banners to push a man out of a job he wasn’t qualified for.

And into a job he might actually grow into.

Right next door.

Twice a season.

Convenient, isn’t it??

None of which excuses Dermot Desmond, of course.

The puppet master golfer still walked away from Keane.

He still re-upped Martin O’Neill for another season.

He still “earmarked” Keane as plan A for next summer.

So if Keane goes to Tynecastle now…

Plan A is dead.

Plan B – Martin O’Neill for another year – is what we’ve already got.

Then, plan C will be next year’s summer car crash.

And spare a thought for our bigger calorie cousins along the M8.

McInnes was about to be eased out the Tynecastle door, and now he’s being carried out on Bloom’s shoulders all the way to Auchenhowie.

The Ibrox side think they’ve nicked Hearts’ best man.

Hearts think they’ve got rid of their glass ceiling man.

And the Gorgie men might be about to land a 145-cap Republic of Ireland international with a name that opens doors in every European boardroom Bloom wants to walk into.

Who wins that swap??

Hugh, where are you on this one, Shug??

I’d love to read the Daily Record column where you spin this one as Desmond respecting the fans.

Did you not read Mark Pirie’s piece, Shug??

In the same f*****g paper??

Because that whole “populist” narrative is about to age like milk in a Barbados sun.

Categorically.

Desmond doesn’t do populism.

He never has.

He never will.

Save the column for next week.

You’re going to need it.

In the meantime, we wait for Tony Bloom.

If Bloom lands Keane, the Sun’s third favourite walks into Tynecastle.

If he doesn’t, one of the Dutch duo does, and Hearts still come out of this with a serious football brain at the wheel.

McInnes’ siege mentality replaced by something that might actually beat us on a wet Wednesday in November.

Are we ready for that??

Are we, really??

Well, the puppet master golfer in Barbados had better be.

Because if Keane signs that Hearts contract, his “future Celtic manager” will be managing the team that came within an 87th-minute kick of taking our title last May.

The fans who shouted him out of Celtic Park will still be getting the pleasure of him in Glasgow twice a year.

Just in a maroon shirt.

And Shug will be back with another cracker of a column telling us Desmond “respected the fans”.

Six-in-a-row incoming, peepul.

Whoever is in the away dugout.

Choose Read Celtic as a ‘Preferred Source’ on Google News for quick access to the news you value.