IT was Scott Brown who brought the Premiership trophy on to the park before the game as Celtic marked their achievement of securing a ninth league title in a row.

The trophy took pride of place in the centre-circle, while the league flag was raised high above the North Stand at Paradise. It was an unusual Flag Day in that there were no fans in Paradise due to the current coronavirus restrictions, but the supporters who watched the game would have been delighted with the performance and result.

And the Celtic captain who, along with James Forrest, has been part of every one of those nine league triumphs, led by example again in the heart of the Hoops midfield.

Brown was delighted with the 5-1 win over Hamilton Accies, which came courtesy of goals from Jeremie Frimpong, Patryk Klimala and an Odsonne Edouard hat-trick.

And the Hoops skipper praised what he described as an ‘all-round great performance’ from the team.

“The lads played very well, to be honest, going two goals up, although we then lost a goal,” he said. “In the second half we’ve come out with a great attitude and showed why we’ve been champions for the last nine years.

“For us, we needed this good performance, especially after having raised the flag before the game.

“Hamilton are very physical, very direct and they tried to bully us, but we stood up to that and played our football and played own game.

“We could have got a couple more goals. We created a lot of chances and yet again, our quality shone through. Odsonne’s hat-trick was great. He’s not scored at all in pre-season – he saved it for the first game of the season which was perfect for us.”

Scott Brown: Bhoys played well and our quality shone through