Celtic are lucky regarding central def injuries

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48 hours ago, Celtic fans were in relative equilibrium.  Defeat in the League Cup and an injury crisis in central defence put paid to that.  Maik Nawrocki injured his hamstring at Rugby Park.  He played until the end of the game, doubtlessly conflicted by the team’s predicament, but as Oh did earlier this month, almost certainly exacerbated the damage.

We are four weeks from our fist Champions League game, with only new signing Gustaf Lagerbielke and Liam Scales fit and able to play in central defence.  Neither have been tested at that level, or played together, and they need to navigate another month without injury before being considered for action.

Cameron Carter-Vickers has a chance of returning for then but is by no means certain, and as you and I both know, rushing a player back from a hamstring is never a good idea.  Yuki Kobayashi should be ready, in the fitness sense, however, reruns of his Ibrox performance from last season will give Brendan Rodgers plenty to consider.  Stephen Welsh will be out until the turn of the year.

Reframe this fortune for what it is.  Celtic are lucky; this happened during the transfer window when the club are in funds.  It is no more than a normal football problem to be addressed.  Brendan will have an idea on when Cameron and Maik can be expected return, he will sign others if necessary.

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359 Comments

  1. fourstone

     

     

    after deleting stivs for swearing

     

     

    I just deleted yours too

     

     

    All posters

     

     

    please use shoite and pash????

     

     

    Everyone knows what it means, and makes me look less petty ;)

  2. every time thems make a bad tackle on the opposition they are the ones rolling about in kid on agony as if its them that has been fouled.

  3. That French ref is very very lenient with Sevco that was another yellow for number 13 but he talks to him

  4. “Rangers are never as bad as we think/hope they are.”

     

     

    Rangers are dead, so probably bad.

     

     

    Last season Sevco were the worst team in the history of the Champions league.

     

     

    Sevco have won 2 trophies in 11 years and bar one anomalous season they finished comfortable behind the ‘Tic. They finished third in a two horse race twice.

     

     

    They are consistently as bad as I hope them to be.

  5. BHEAVER

     

     

    Apols see previous for stivs and fourstonecoppi

     

     

    (never rains etc etc)

     

     

    Now we have shoite, pash and vajeenbad??? for c%ntwell

  6. One observation is that Tavernier is getting caught out of position almost in every attack. Maeda and Yang will be watching with interest.

  7. I’ve been out all day marvelling at the Falkirk Wheel and the old fort on the Antonine wall and the Kelpies. So, I’ve missed most of the discussion.

     

     

    However, after, such concentrated domestic success as we have had recently, it is understandable that our aims turn to Europe. BTW- I would not belittle this century’s achievements as just staying ahead of Ra Rangers. We have absolutely mollicated the “Rangers” achievement. If we had merely won 60% of the titles and trophies to their 40%, then that would be a reasonable charge but it’s not the case and it is just our own fans trashing the hard won victories of our team for some reason.

     

     

    Anyway, back to a desire to do better win Europe. I played my sport in a mixed team, even though we were called the Cardinals, and my blue nosed team mates in the 90’s never tired of telling me that Celtic were no longer their rivals as they saw themselves as a European level team, and we were no threat to them in Scotland as we were rarely finishing even second in the league.

     

     

    So I can understand the tendency to look at Europe in those circumstances but it carries the danger of hubris if you cannot live up to your self identified aim. There is no question that “Rangers” getting to 2 Uefa finals is better than our record in getting to only one. But we made the last 16 of CL on three occasions and they only got there once. I think it can be argued that we have out-performed them in the eyes of other European clubs. I doubt any informed football pundit outwith Scotland would credit them as a better team than us or even one that does better in Europe.