IN THE LONG RUN

On the 13th December this year, Celtic beat Hamilton Academical 3-1, extending the Hoops' unbeaten run to 55 games. In 1915 to 1917 Willey Maley's Celtic team won 62 on the trot including two wins in a day beating Raith Rovers and Motherwell.

This is chicken feed compared to the formidable Steau Bucharest, who between 1986-9 were unbeaten in 104 matches winning the Champions' League, being also runners up and getting to a CL semi-final between 1985-9.

Lincoln Football Club had a 88 match long run of success in GIBRALTAR, being the first "Rock" club to play in Europe. They lost in the early rounds to Faroe Islands', Torshavn 2-5 in July 2017. The Imps lasted 1959 days in their league without a defeat, though they did lose two Rock Cup ties in that period. They were Gibraltan champions over 14 years from 2002.

The Moldovan team, FK Sheriff from Tiraspol, were national champions for 10 years from 2001 with no losses in the 2006-7 season, amounting to 63 matches. Sheriff unsurprisingly were founded in 1997 by a former policeman, Victor Gusan, who worked for Sheriff Security Corporation the club's main sponsor. In 2013-14 they played Spurs in the European league group K and lost both games, coming 3rd. they are doing quite well in this year's competition. Make them your favourite Moldovan side, but first of all you have to find Moldova.

In a more serious league (it's all relative of course), Serie A's AC Milan were 58 games unbeaten under Fabio Capello from 1991-3. They won three league titles and a Champions' League in 1993-4. Where did it all go wrong Fabio?

Real Madrid had gone 40 games unbeaten this season but eventually lost to Sevilla 1-2 on Sunday, beating Barcelona's 39 from 2015-16. Mind you they have just won into the final of the FIFA Club Championship beating Al Jazira with Ronaldo and Bale chipping into the 2-1 victory from 0-1 down. They meet Gremio on Saturday....see yesterday's blog.