Nir Bitton has reminded critics of Scottish football that Joey Barton was a complete flop.
Celtic’s 27 point lead over Aberdeen has drawn sneering complaints from critics down south who can’t get their head around life outside of their Premier League bubble.
Brendan Rodgers gets it, Scott Sinclair and Moussa Dembele get it.
Earlier this season it took Rodgers to destroy the myth of Manchester City. It’s hard to argue that Pep Guardiola has still to recover from watching his side draw 3-3 at Celtic Park.
On their day Celtic are a match for any English club but few English sides would have the mental strength to pick up 26 wins and a draw from 27 matches.
Barton lasted one match against the hoops, after mouthing off about what he was going to do to Scott Brown he went into hiding and was never seen again in a Sevco shirt.
Speaking to STV Bitton said: “There are a lot of people who look at the Scottish table and think ‘oh ok, Celtic are the best team in Scotland and they’ve no competition in this league. It’s far from being true.
“Players from the Premier League like Joey Barton and Niko Kranjcar came to Scotland and thought ‘yeah it’s going to be easy’ but no, it’s not easy. It’s a very competitive league.
“It’s not as easy as it looks on the table. I think every game was difficult and every game you play in the Scottish league is going to be difficult for you. The other team’s going to try to defend and to get something out of the game.
“We’ve just made it look easy but it wasn’t.”
After getting his Sevco pay-off Barton walked into the Burnley team and was quickly picking up man-of-the-match awards.