Even now, almost a quarter of a century later, the memories of Wim Jansen’s single season as Celtic manager echo through the years – as fresh as the days they were minted. In pure football terms season 1997-98 probably wouldn’t figure in Celtic’s all-time top ten. Certainly, any season when a league title is accompanied with a cup ought to be considered a good one. In that year though, there were few of those symphonic occasions when everything seemed to click and you felt transported by the quality of the football.

Yet, to be a Celtic supporter that season was about much, much more than just the football. It will retain its sacred status in Celtic’s pantheon, of course, because the title win stopped our oldest rivals reaching the iconic ten in a row. But there were other factors that made it special. It signalled the end of a chaotic five-year period in Celtic’s history when Fergus McCann strove to re-awaken this club and drag it into the modern era. And it produced Henrik Larsson, perhaps the first authentically world-class player to wear the hoops since the last of the Lisbon Lions retired.

Certainly, you could make a case for Danny McGrain or Paul McStay or George Connelly or Kenny Dalglish, but with Henrik you sensed that here was a player who was giving us his best years at a time when he would have been coveted by the modern giants of European football. This was borne out by his subsequent spells at Barcelona and Manchester United and an international career with Sweden who were then regularly ranked among the world’s top 20. The milestones of 97-98 still resonate. There was the League Cup win against Dundee United at Ibrox and, not long afterwards, that glorious Lambert and Burley win against Rangers when we knew this team was made of the right stuff.

I remember a family Christening on the day we needed a win at East End Park to lift the title on the penultimate Saturday of the season. What better occasion to celebrate the arrival of my new-born nephew. And then, in keeping with the way Celtic seem to do these things, there was that Dunfermline equaliser at the death leading to the most nervous week I’ve ever endured watching this club.

The following Saturday marked the end of my first week in my new role as Sports Editor-in-chief at The Scotsman and Scotland on Sunday. I thought it would be the professional thing to remain outwardly impervious to what was happening at Celtic Park against St Johnstone. I was, after all, an unrepentant Glaswegian who’d been let loose on Edinburgh’s establishment newspaper empire. Watch your step and all that.

But with the score stuck at 1-0 and the knowledge that a St Johnstone equaliser would bring about the Apocalypse it became too much and I had to leave the office and take a walk up the Royal Mile. I’d estimated that by the time I returned the game would be over. The staff entrance to the grand old Scotsman building at that time was guarded by a brilliant doorman called Jock who was a true blue Rangers fan. He was a cheery soul who lifted your spirits whenever you arrived for your work and we enjoyed a lot of Celtic/Rangers repartee.

I’d bought him a bottle of whisky the year before when Rangers secured their own nine and as I walked up the steps of the old back door he was grinning. I took this as a presentiment of doom and, for a few seconds, I experienced that numbness you feel when Celtic lose a crucial last-minute goal, except multiplied about 100 times.

But Jock thrust out his hand and said “Congratulations, big man. And here’s a wee something to celebrate.” The bottle of Grouse was studiously tanned throughout the second and third editions with a group of Edinburgh sub-editors whom I insisted become Celtic fans for the rest of the shift.

In the wake of Celtic’s gritty win at Tynecastle this week several supporters began to observe similarities between this season and 97-98. Like that season we had a bad start to this campaign with new players trying to adapt and an opening day defeat by a team from Edinburgh. And we’re up against a Rangers side carrying two seasons of momentum. The game next Wednesday is just as crucial as that memorable 2-0 win in January of ’98.

Perhaps the most obvious similarity is between Wim Jansen and Ange Postecoglu, which goes well beyond the fact of this being Ange’s maiden season just as 97-98 was for Wim Jansen. Like our astute Dutch manager back then Ange Postecoglu has encountered a measure of disdain and outright disrespect by a section of Scotland’s broadcast football hacks. If you want evidence just listen to some of the questions Postecoglu gets asked in his weekly press conferences. They betray ignorance; laziness and an absence of originality or intellectual rigour. A working knowledge of football beyond these shores does not seem to be a basic job requirement. Something of this was also evident when Dr Jo Venglos arrived at Parkhead. He was dismissed by some Scottish football journalists for being too old; having an academic qualification and, er … not being very successful. This despite the fact that he’d led an excellent Czechoslovakian team to the last eight of a World Cup at a time when Scottish international teams were full of players who regarded having two good feet as evidence of a misspent youth. Wim Jansen quickly had the measure of the Scottish football press and Ange Postecoglu is forcing his inquisitors to think very carefully about the questions they put to him following a number of verbal eviscerations by this wise and seasoned Australian.

There is one other big reason why I drank a toast to the memory of Wim following his death. Ever since May 6, 1970 when Feyenoord beat Celtic in the European Cup final I had been unable to bring myself to look at any footage from the game. After Wim brought us the league title nearly three decades later a kind of healing took place and I’ve since been able to watch it calmly.

Two aspects of it immediately became clear: Celtic really weren’t as bad as has since been portrayed and certainly didn’t look like they were ill-prepared or had under-estimated their opponents. Feyenoord were simply an outstanding football team who had won the Dutch title in a season when Ajax had reached the European Cup final. Several of their players would play a part in the Dutch national team’s success throughout the next five years.

And Wim Jansen, anchoring the midfield against Celtic, was simply magnificent. What a player. And what a manager he was for us. God rest him.