The score-line shows a narrow win, but the substance of Celtic’s second half performance was significantly different from what we have seen so often this season, including the first half. Lots of good chances were created – and missed – however, this was reassuring as we hoped not only for a win, but for a substantive change of fortunes.
Moreover, Brendan Rodgers will surely ponder what changes were made at halftime to bring about an effect he worked on since Sunday’s defeat, but failed to materialise at kick off.
The first half provided only more frustrating material. Leigh Griffiths looked as ponderous as Odsonne Edouard has been recently. Had it been Edouard who missed two great chances with the scores still level, not Leigh, the French striker would have come under yet more pressure, but even our goal-den striker was finding it tough.
Progress happens one step at a time and with 83 minutes gone, Leigh was the wrong side of the ball when James Forrest’s header was blocked, with a defender either side of him and a third opponent closer to the ball. Leigh was the most alert man in the stadium. He swivelled and was on the ball before anyone else knew what was happening. His finish was none too shabby, either.
I don’t know what was said by Dedryck Boyata to referee John Beaton in the 90th minute but Brendan Rodgers summed it up well, intimating the player passed up several opportunities not to be red carded, but chose to persist with a grievance, the validity of which is moot. The card was more for rank stupidity than anything said.
Scott Bain has not had much game time recently, so I get that he wanted to be involved in the dying seconds of added time, but his walkabout nearly sent us into extra time with 10 men. Goalkeeping is first and foremost about decision making. Scott made a howler.
Ask anyone and they will tell you that inconsistency in defensive selection leads to poor understanding and results. Despite a catalogue of central defensive injuries, we have now achieved five clean sheets in six games – all with Dedryck in the team. He’s a leader.
Coming as it did during a form slump, last night’s League Cup quarterfinal was a worry, I could sense the triple treble disappearing in the Perthshire air. Lesser teams would have lost. But, we are through to semi against Hearts, which will be played either at Hampden, where we are imperious, or Murrayfield, scene of our memorable 3-0 victory over Legia Warsaw.
History turns on nights like that.
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in brendan i trust
In Brendan I’m not as sure as I used to be.
who scored when we beat legia 3-0 ?
Much better 2nd half last night, agree with Auldheid, fine margins, if we scored when we were all over them,45-55 minutes, we could have scored 4 or 5.
A statement on the club’s official website read: “Former Celtic reserve player Graeme Morrison sadly passed away on Tuesday night at the age of only 41-years-old after losing his battle with pancreatic cancer.
“The centre-half, who joined on an ‘s’ form in 1991, was a regular in the youth and reserve sides between signing as a professional in 1994 and leaving to join Tampere in Finland in 1999.
“During Graeme’s time with Celtic, he also went on loan to Irish club, Dundalk where he made a handful of first-team league appearances.
So our treble is still on despite the Belgian – Thought Morgan looked the part last night. On to the dandies.
Look at the goal again, JF should have buried it but headed it straight at the defender in front of the goalie, either side would have done. It comes off the defender straight back out to the penalty area. It could have gone anywhere. We got lucky. One point about the red card. If DB had managed to keep a lid on it, the defender could and should, have been sent off for his double foul. We’ll never know.
Apologies in advance for the recycling …
Not much of a game last night apart from a collections of wasted chances from us.
St.J were incredibly poor especially in the first half where they only played in one half of the park.
Another game where we were absolutely honking.
We have no CB problems — we just need to play SB there as this is where he always ends up.
LG — I do appreciate that God loves a trier but even he must have had his doubts. He was shocking before he got his wee break.
CMcG — He is possibly the most useless player I have ever seen for 90% of the time.
He was absolutely atrocious yesterday on top of quite a few stinkers recently.
Desperately needs dropped for someone who looks half way interested,
We started the game low in confidence and limited in application.
We tried to bore them to death rather than play any sort of direct, attacking football.
Even when we took the lead all it took was a good move from them an the fear descended.
We played as if we were running over eggshells.
All is not well — BR seems to be sending out smoke signals.
We looked over-coached and under-motivated — not a great place to be.
The balance sheet is king and everybody knows that.
*****
*****
Finally the away support need to get a grip.
The singing last night was straight out of the D’Oyly Carte Republican Opera Company.
We are fast becoming a music hall act for the self indulgent and the obtuse.
All that was missing was a rendition of “SS RUC” — probably tells you a lot about the average age.
Supporters you were not — bunch of wannabee Burton’s commandos more like.
Trying to look and act the part even though the 70’s called and asked for their songbook back.
Love the trade off — providing money to our opponents.
You keep Scottish football afloat so that you can spout sham militarism across the land.
All that was missing was a green poppy — 6 weeks to go though.
Why is Brendan going public with the job offers stories.
he could shut that down very easily without confirming. Can you imagine if Boaya or Ntchan, went to the press and said the yhad received big money offers from elsewhere.
BR plays a strange game with the press up here, some of it totally misguided.
The whole team is lacking in confidence and desire.
Everything we do is over analysed and over thought.
The split second delay allows the opposition to get in the way.
All the shots were passes disguised as attempts at goal.
Over coached off the park and over awed on the park.
This Chinese club that ‘allegedly’ offered BR all this money. Not the same one that ‘allegedly’ bid £21m for Moreles? I smell S___e.
BR’s smoke signals.
The recent accounts tell the story in crayon.
2017/18 — T/O tops £100mill and all we can hope for is player trading.
No investment in the squad — money out = money in.
Job done for the bonus hunter.
2018/19 — no investment.
Projects, loans, free agents, golden oldies but no real investment.
No wonder people are engaging with their agents.
We either progress or we stagnate and fail.
Stagnation is winning and we will lose.
Wonder if Scott Brown could have done more to calm his team mate when Beaton told him, ‘I’m going to send him off’. Anyway, Dedryck lost the rag, but I’ve no qualms with that, good to see passion and fight. Hope he called him a cheating bassa. I can barely remember Beaton giving us a foul last night, when we scored the rage came over him. Did he have cash on us to go out or did his paymasters ask him to ‘fix’ the fixture problem, or maybe he’s just a sticky bun with a whistle.
Anyway, good performance and result. Brendan has handled the situation well since Sunday. Some positive individual performances too. Hopefully the sight of Logan and Shinnie will have us well fired up come Saturday.
Saturday is a sell out, bed wetters and boo boys need not apply, support the manager and support the team.
D17- i would have Mulumbu in MF on Saturday, they will come kicking,the MIBS are on it big time.
SAINT STIVS on 27TH SEPTEMBER 2018 12:08 PM
who scored when we beat legia 3-0 ?
………………..
Marta, the Legia Club secretary was credited with scoring all three. ?
Crazy by Boyata.
Why didn’t he just take his frustrations out by sticking his studs into the St Johnstone player who committed the foul ?
Very unprofessional.
BB @ 12.36
And support the bonus hunter?
The time to complain is when we start to slide not when we hit the slump.
Big game on Saturday that will tell us a lot.
Need to win the battle and then win the game.
Paul67
Admire your opTIMism.
Tierney Ntcham and Forrest need the rest to up their game.
Griffiths has to improve his conversion ratio as we can, it seems forget about lasts seasons top scorer who’s warming the bench.
Glad the Cup takes precedence and our best defender is available for Aberdeen.
So we got three fouls awarded to us last night. If I remember correctly one of those was a late tackle on Scott Brown where James Forrest was faced with only one man and plenty of space to run into.
Did the ref choose to ignore the possibility of playing on? Or is he really that incompetent?
I must admit that I only vaguely knew the name Graeme Morrison but it is very sad to hear of the death of a man at just 42 years and a family devastated. RiP.
S/S @ 12.47
Thank heavens for TV and cameras at the game.
It is keeping the MIB in check to some degree.
However they are always looking for a new way to hold us back.
The Ludge must be a hive of activity trying to work out new angles to get at us.
The Hertz angle will be interesting — will they split their effort or will they support the team with the most points?
Thought we were too passive first half. Second half much better, although still not using enough width.
Thought Hendry did quite well. Also Morgan. Have we finally unearthed a winger who knows where the wing is? Would like to see him getting a few starts, maybe for Forrest who has been quiet and still comes inside too often for me.
Anyway, the win was the main thing in the end. Work still to be done though.
Speaking of China….
…whatever happened to the Hai Phong Cement FC money (and yes, I know they’re Vietnamese)
MADMITCH on 27TH SEPTEMBER 2018 12:43 PM
BB @ 12.36
And support the bonus hunter?
The time to complain is when we start to slide not when we hit the slump.
Big game on Saturday that will tell us a lot.
Need to win the battle and then win the game.
The in house politics at CP will always be there, Lawwell,Bankier et al,we are going through a rough patch,and going by some of the stuff on here in the last few weeks, some posters are going through their first Celtic rough patch. Park the Transfer Window, park Dembele, let’s support the manager and the team on the park. I separated the board and the team many years ago. HH
Bada
I’d play Broonie, N’tcham and Mulumbu from the off on Saturday to serve notice to McInnes that we mean business and will meet fire with fire. Young Morgan must also start, in my opinion, as he’s a bit gallus which I love. He’s direct and has skill aplenty. I can’t wait.
Hail! Hail!
Will be a toss of the coin to decide semi finals, I remember the last Masonic carve up….
!!BADA BING!! on 27TH SEPTEMBER 2018 12:36 PM
Saturday is a sell out, bed wetters and boo boys need not apply, support the manager and support the team.
…..
Correct, post of the day….
H.H
Was at the game last night, behind the goal where the Boyata carry on happened so had a good view. As St J had put two up front and were chasing the game Beaton was, as usual, ignoring assaults on Celtic players hence Boyata going Tonto – can’t blame him as we were all going mad in the stand.
The Ajer injury was also around the same area and, in my view, the St J player went over the ball – straight red – and caught Ajer. Beaton was in the vicinity but was looking elsewhere and not even a foul given when everyone could see Ajer was in trouble.
This ‘looking away’ from assaults on our players is getting tiresome – Thomson on Sunday, done the exact same when Kieran was obstructed by two Killie players late on.
Walking back to our minibus after the game had to laugh at two St J fans cursing Tommy Wright for ‘Shiting It Against Us Again’ and not playing two up front till we scored as we then ’Shat’ ourselves. Is this farm language?
EffluentCSC
Graeme Morrison.
Rip young mhan.
YNWA.
TOSB- Morgan looked very confident, looked for the ball, and floated about the forward line, the type Brendan has improved since he came in.HH
Too true Paul67 ‘The Belgian’ was very silly , he should have just called Beaton ‘ A wee nincompoop’ and moved on !
I thought Big Dedryck played really well, he always looks to turn defense into attack.
MADMITCH on 27TH SEPTEMBER 2018 12:30 PM
The whole team is lacking in confidence and desire.
Everything we do is over analysed and over thought.
The split second delay allows the opposition to get in the way.
All the shots were passes disguised as attempts at goal.
Over coached off the park and over awed on the park.
That is the problem when a coach lacks introspection.
His system has to be adhered to and it’s reducing the potency and strengths of some of our players.
There is a glaring lack of anticipation in our team due to our overcommitment to possession above all.
Our goal last night came from a rare pass played in front of our man (KT) to run on to and get behind opponent.
The only other time we did it was Nt’chams great pass to McGregor in the first.
Both were diagonal balls behind opponents which have a lower completion percentage that seem to be frowned upon as we rarely attempt.
Oh and big shout out to young Jack Hendry who played very well last night. Knuckle down son and keep it simple. Your confidence will improve with each win and the fans will get behind you.
Think Eddy will keep his place on Saturday, if nothing else for his height at set peices. He does the job Moussa did defending the front post. Morgan must be very close to a start. Mulumbu a big yes for me.
Dembele starting to deliver on his fee for Lyon with two goals and MOTM.
Boyata is no one’s favourite for justifiable reasons. However he needs to be defended. I can not remember ever seeing a player get a red card for dissent. It’s a ridiculous decision. The club should appeal.
We won last night and still we’re surrounded by negativity. Yes, I agree that our lack of confidence and nerves amongst our players but in the second half we came out fighting and created chances. There was a world of difference between last night’s performance and what we witnessed at Rugby Park on Sunday. We missed a lot of chances but Griff has scored 3 goals in his last 3 games. That builds confidence and leads to doubles and hat tricks. I detect signs of improvement. Beat Aberdeen on Saturday and we’ll start to climb the table. The positives are there if you want to look for them.