IT DID not end like it started.

July 20, Celtic's first competitive game of the season, brought a frustrating 1-1 draw with FC Midtjylland as Ange Postecoglou made his bow in front of just 9,000 fans.

May 14, Celtic's last competitive game of the season, brought an exhilarating 6-0 win over Motherwell as Postecoglou lifted the Premiership trophy in front of 60,000.

The story by now is one known to everyone. From Melbourne to Glasgow, from Yokohama to Attica, tales of the resuscitation job Postecoglou has performed on a club he found in distress have been recanted well and will continue to be regaled in the months and years to come. They are not an exaggeration.

Yet the manager has always stressed the importance of the collective in all this. Whether that's been an aversion to singling out star performers too often or insisting different members of his backroom staff join him in one of his (many) manager of the month photocalls, that emphasis on the group over the individual has been there.

It was thus again at Parkhead against Motherwell. Postecoglou's team gave him perhaps the most fitting finale to his first season in the hotseat with a scintillating, professionally ruthless display to dismantle the Steelmen 6-0.

The goals were quite 'Postecoglou' themselves. The first, an ingenious Kyogo Furuhashi finish through the defender's legs to beat the keeper at his near post following a Jota corner. The second, from David Turnbull, owing as much to Daizen Maeda's persistence as it did the scorer's cool head. The third, as Celtic as you'll get: a perfectly-weighted ball over the Well defence from Anthony Ralston - his ninth direct assist of the season, by the way - for the onrushing Furuhashi to volley home first time. Goals, in short, that were worthy of the occasion.

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By the time Jota slotted home the fourth and Giorgos Giakoumakis bicycle kicked his stamp on proceedings the game had ceased to be anything other than an all-out party for those in green and white. The big Greek added another late on to cap his maiden campaign with the division's top scorer accolade.

Postecoglou, as is his wont, spoke in the build-up not only of enjoying the moment a title triumph brings but also the impact it can have on the next campaign.

"The best bit, the big kicker, for me (is watching the celebrations)," he said. "Not just the players but the staff and the supporters... just to sit back and see the joy that it brings.

"I learned a while ago that you need to let people enjoy that moment because I'm going to ask them to go back to the well again next year. If they don't enjoy the fruits of their labour they're going to question why they should do it again."

There was no doubting the enjoyment on display when the players finally got their hands on the fruits of their labour in front of their adoring public at Paradise. Postecoglou was there, as he said he would be, watching the joy from the best seat in the house.

There were scarves, there were banners, there were jerseys. Green and white hoops raised in triumph once more. And at the centre of it all, one man with a vision only just starting to be realised.