IT turns out that Hamilton Academical have recorded more than one milestone victory over Celtic this season.

As memorable as last Sunday's 1-0 triumph at Parkhead was, being their first since 1938, of equal importance to the long-term health of Scotland's unlikely league leaders was the fact that earlier in the season they managed to fend off Celtic when their all-conquering youth team attempted to entice one of the star talents from the Accies youth academy.

Parents, it appears, are gradually cottoning on that an Old Firm academy upbringing isn't automatically the best thing for their children. This process is only likely to be hastened after eight products of the Lanarkshire club's academy featured at Celtic Park on Sunday.Celtic named one graduate of their youth set-up, 19-year-old Irishman Eoghan O'Connell. He was among the unused substitutes.

"This season has certainly been a turning point for us," said manager Alex Neil, still basking in the afterglow of that win. "It is probably the first time we have managed to keep a player. Celtic were the club that were interested in the player and we managed to convince him and his parents that this was the best place for him. We have never been in a position where we have been able to keep players before. They generally move on, because maybe their parents were either Rangers or Celtic fans, and it was so ingrained in their beliefs that if one of those big clubs came in, then that was where you should go."

Neil is an impressive individual, unafraid to speak his mind, and while he is hugely critical of how the Old Firm machine chews up young talent and spits it out, he is sympathetic to the short-termism which prevents managers at the big clubs from experimenting with youth.

By contrast, Hamilton's success is a story of low-key progression. Neil has played alongside, or coached at under-17 or under-20 level, this season's unlikely heroes such as Ziggy Gordon, Grant Gillespie, Mikey Devlin and Ali Crawford, . There is also an emerging generation such as Eamonn Brophy, Darren Lyon and Greg Docherty. Neil knows many of the players' families, who will get a special invitation to a meal ahead of Friday night's meeting with Aberdeen.

"The Old Firm buy our best players when they are under 15s or under 17s, and even younger than that," said Neil. "They don't come for the second or third best, they buy up the best - the guys who we think have the most potential. For them moving there at times has really hindered their progress because they are never going to make the first team. I couldn't actually name one who has.

"We get them back at 21, 22 and they have lost four years of their development when potentially they could have played in our first team at 18. That's a problem because they are hoovering up all the young talent in Scotland then suppressing it by not playing them.

"However, if you are in charge of a Celtic team and put out a young side who get beaten then it's a different story. You're judged on results so I really do sympathise with the manager and how they do things there. It's not easy. But certainly with Rangers being out the league, Celtic had a chance to try to bed more youngsters into the team. I think they're getting better at doing it … but it's easier at Accies because it's all we've got."

Neil is just 33, younger than every Scottish manager outwith Stirling Albion's Greg McDonald, and every now and then he rues his inability to fully devote himself to the last of his playing days, like any other thirtysomething footballer.

But managing is now his life. Billy Reid, his managerial mentor, is currently assistant to Graham Potter at Swedish side Ostersunds, having turned down the lure of Swansea. Like Reid, Neil he will surely get the chance to move to bigger and better things. Unlike Reid, however, he appears keen to take that chance - as long as the timing and the project is right.

"Billy had his opportunity when the Swansea job came up for him," said Neil. "I told him to take it. I think anybody who knows me knows I want to go on and do the best that I can. That is not about leaving Hamilton, just in general. I want to take this team as far as I possibly can, and I still think there is a lot more scope for us. It would have to be the right job at the right time in the right place but if I am honest it has not even crossed my mind."

As alluring as the New Douglas Park narrative is, there was a moment where the entire project teetered on a precipice. Who knows what would have happened if Tony Andreu hadn't popped up with that decisive goal in the 90th minute of the play-off final second leg at Easter Road?

"You could look at that across the history of the football, if he didn't score that goal that day or if he didn't play well where would we be?" said Neil. "There's always turning points within teams and journeys that you will go on."

Neil and this crop of young talent are taking Hamilton on quite a ride.