The contingent of Kyogo Furuhashi, Reo Hatate, Daizen Maeda, the little-seen Yosuke Ideguchi and new signing Yuki Kobayashi – latest recruit Tomoki Iwata has yet to feature – traditionally turn and bow to the pitch on exiting it. Ange Postecoglou, who spent three-and-a-half years in charge of Yokahama F Marinos before pitching up in Glasgow 19 months ago, is well accustomed to a practice that has noble intentions. “It’s a common thing,” he said. “It’s part of their culture. It’s a sign of respect, it’s the way they’re brought up. In the J League you’ll find that the whole team bows to their supporters, as a way of acknowledging them.”

The slight Furuhashi, with 38 goals in 61 appearances since his £4.7million move from Vissel Kobe in July 2021, hasn’t bowed to physical demands of the Scottish game. The rough and tumble nature of football in this country was expected to present a challenge to his penalty-box effectiveness. They have not because the player does not battle in the danger areas but breeze around them using his brain, Postecoglou intimates.

“The J League isn’t an easy league to play in, you find most strikers in the J League are foreigners because they need to be a decent size to compete,” said the Australian. “But I knew with Kyogo’s movement he’d been successful there and he’s a very intelligent player, he knows where to be and how to avoid contact. He’s a helluva finisher so I never had any issues about the physical side here. He scored a couple of times against Yokohama but I’d noticed him before that. He did very well against us, although we did beat them [Vissel Kobe] a few times. I remember our defenders talking about how difficult he was to track when he played against us. Yokohama played a similar kind of game model, wanted to defend pretty aggressively with a high line and he was one who, because of his movement, gave our defenders problems.”

Pitch ritual spotted from Celtic’s Japanese players explained by Ange Postecoglou

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