THERE is no question that Scottish football has missed the often rather gory carnival of the Old Firm match.

 

Whether Scottish society has missed it is another thing altogether.

It is all subjective, of course. Those working in your local Accident and Emergency Unit, no doubt battening down the hatches as we speak, can be forgiven for harbouring a marginally different view from the beermonsters salivating over their Sunday coach trip from the Rangers or Celtic Supporters' Clubs nearby.

To these eyes, life around Glasgow, in particular, has seemed calmer, a little less discoloured by a rivalry between green and blue that can too often end up with the spilling of claret, in the two-and-a-half years since Rangers found themselves being ordered to begin again in the old Third Division.

Supporters of both sides have, generally, been getting on with their own business. If attendances are anything to go by, that business, for many, has involved stopping going to football altogether.

The prelude to this League Cup semi-final meeting at Hampden, though, has caused some unpleasant old issues to resurface. The newspaper advertisement taken out to pronounce Rangers officially dead was an early exercise in provocation.

Once upon a time, you would change seats on the bus if the hairy-nosed oddity wearing the stained tennis shorts and carrying a solitary banana in a plastic bag started flicking his tongue lasciviously at you.

Nowadays, you would volunteer to spend the journey sitting on his lap in your own tennis shorts rather than share it with one of these tiresome Newco, Oldco, Sevco obsessives.

We have also been reminded of the historical rise in domestic violence around this fixture thanks to Police Scotland's decision to draft in extra staff to focus on that issue alone. Meetings between officers and players from both clubs have also taken place, which is, it must be said, faintly ridiculous.

We demand theatre when the Old Firm meet. We demand expressive protagonists. If there is a barney on the pitch, the occasion will be the better for it.

It is down to general society, rather than footballers, to show it can deal with the return of this fixture to the calendar and it should be noted that Scotland has recently shown itself capable of appearing adult to the world.

Friends and relatives in Catalonia speak regularly of their admiration for the way the independence debate, outwith the odd skirmish in George Square, was handled here.

We had a long conversation on an emotive subject. We had a vote. The dust settled. We got on with life. It is a far cry from the childish posturing going on there over broadly the same issue.

No-one is asking Rangers and Celtic fans to start cuddling up to each other like Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney. Football is tribal. You are allowed to hate your oldest rivals for 90 minutes.

Can we just maintain the peace when it is all over and keep making progress?

It is easy to fear the worst ahead of tomorrow, but that does not mean we cannot hope for the best.