Being a Celtic Supporter is not exactly good for your health these days, after getting back into a decent position in the League and Cup, we blew it big time yesterday afternoon at Tannadice. It’s still possible to win the Double, but we would probably need a perfect last nine matches, and maybe some help from others. We would normally have the league already in the bag with seven games to go, but this season has been one disappointment after another, too many mistakes have been made by too many people, that’s not normal for us, and we need to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
I have to say I was a little but surprised by the team selection yesterday, I was pretty sure that after a brilliant game at Snake Mountain Auston Trusty would have returned to our defence, I think Ben Arthur has looked very promising so far, but maybe we needed that wee bit extra experience in the heart of our defence. I also think we should be looking to change our system to get our main striker some support, whoever happens to be in always seems to be isolated up front.
The playing pitch at Tannadice was absolutely abysmal, and I know that it’s the same for both teams, but you can’t play the type of football we do on a ploughed field. That being said, why didn’t we play the surface, get the ball up to the park instead of trying to play nice touchy passing football? And where is our aggression in midfield? We seemed to get bullied by every team we play, what would you give for a Scott Brown or Roy Aitken now, even a Neil Lennon. We have suffered badly through injuries this season, we suffered more through the appointment of Wifried Nancy.
I genuinely believed we had turned the corner with our display against Motherwell, and the fighting displays at Snake Mountain, but if we want to win games we need to show more hunger, and far more aggression, we need to fight for every ball, we saw the exhaustion in some of our players after beating Motherwell, I didn’t see that yesterday, if you don’t leave everything you’ve got out on the park at Celtic, then you’re at the wrong club. We need some of our injured players back ASAP, I think it’s possible AJ and Arne Engels could be close, that will help, but every single player needs to up their game, our opponents smell blood and think we are weak, we need to show them that’s not the case.
Looking at the stats from yesterday, we had possession for three quarters of the game, but possession counts for nothing, goals win games, and conceding goals costs your games. We had three shots on target from 74% possession, to win games you need to get into your opponent’s box, and you need to take shots at goal, just like United’s second goal, it came through a crowd of Celtic players, the first goal was worse, your man, Will Ferry had more time than the Glen Sannox, you wouldn’t get away with that kind of defending in Junior Football.
I’m not going to blame Nick Walsh for our defeat, but it seems like every tackle by a Celtic player is a foul, he booked Liam Scales in the first half for tussling with the big striker, it wasn’t a foul, never mind a yellow card. The keeper made a save from Daizen in the second half, but Walsh gave a goal kick. The match officials in Scotland have to be amongst the worst in Europe, we will see how many are selected to officiate at the World Cup in the summer. The bottom line is this, nobody is going to hand Celtic the League Title or the Scottish Cup, you have to go and earn it, you have to be better and stronger than everyone else, including the officials. It’s time to prove you’re worthy of wearing the Celtic Jersey, because if you don’t, you won’t have one next season.
Celtic are still the Champions, and Glasgow is still Green & White.
