Celtic hunt in packs.
Leipzig possessed tremendous ability to switch the ball across the field with speed and accuracy. Celtic hunted the ball down, packs of players swooped on the man in possession, then often switched to the other side of the field, before swooping again.
This took oceans of energy, but most of all speed. How many times did you notice Callum McGregor or Ryan Christie scarper 30 yards at full pace, just to add defensive cover? This is why Leipzig created so few good chances until the latter stages of the game.
Leipzig can do nothing about Forrest.
All they could do with James Forrest is get close enough to concede a foul and receive a caution. The often showed James inside, but he can drop a shoulder and escape with the ball so well he was literally unplayable.
Tiredness before equaliser.
Before Leipzig’s equaliser the visitors had three substitutes on the field, whereas, Celtic persevered with the starting 11. Rogic, Sinclair, Forrest and especially Lustig were tired. I was desperate for Brendan to put fresh legs on. Forrest was still capable of tormenting the Leipzig defence, so I was surprised when he was replaced with 7 minutes left, but Sinclair and Rogic both made significant contributions in the final minutes.
Peter, get ready for the summer.
We know the script when it comes to French under-21 internationals. Leipzig could not get the ball off Odsonne Edouard inside the box. Could. Not. Get. The. Ball. Off. Him. There will be a clamour for this boy’s signature. I know it’s the last thing we want and how difficult it is to continue to go to the well and get the same results, but this one is in the post.
McGregor, Christie, Sinclair, Forrest and Rogic.
Yesterday I wrote that I wanted these five tested at this level. They determined Celtic’s entire structure and pace of play. The result was that we played our best football in Europe for a long time. They have already done the same to our domestic form. We will need Scott Brown and Olivier Ntcham this season, but we cannot this midfield just to accommodate either of them.
Life’s great experiences!
The moment the stadium fell dark, bar spotlights on the centre circle, took my breath away. For the next five minutes, I was mesmerised. If life’s great experiences are truly priceless, the new light system at Celtic Park was worth every penny, whatever the cost. 60,000 people stood in awe, and there are a good few hardened cynics among them.
You and me have had some great times in recent years.
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Ireland going for ten (home wins) in a row at the Aviva in the egg chasing. They lead 25 – 17 with twelve minutes left.
It’s on Network 2 and Channel 4.
BSR
Aye, refreshing candour.
I know he’s ThomTheTim’s bhoy but he is an interesting and well-informed pundit.
HH
St Stivs,
Neil Lennon has hit out at the abuse he has suffered in Scotland, writes Tommy Martin.
Oh, the wee huns are shite!
Oh, the wee huns are shite!
Oh, the wee huns are shite!
Oh, the wee huns are shite!
Celtic are beating Hearts 5-0 and the Parkhead faithful are in fine voice. As the song suggests, games against the Edinburgh side are a sort of Old Firm Light for the Celtic faithful, a PG-certified take on the Glasgow derby’s X-rated thrills.
It is also my son’s first Celtic game. Why bring a child into the maelstrom of Scottish football’s tribal squabbles, you may ask? Well there is not much choice in the matter, to be frank. If a troublesome fondness for Tottenham Hotspur can be carefully sidelined, he will represent the fifth generation of Celtic fans in our family, a connection, we think, that goes back to the club’s foundation in 1888.
No pressure, kid.
He seems to be enjoying himself and the raucous atmosphere helps. He gets James Forrest’s name on his jersey and even has a meat pie. Thankfully there’s too much noise for anyone to hear him say that he felt a bit sorry for Hearts and that maybe it would be nice if they got a goal too.
Because there is no mood for mercy today. Not because this is a top-of-the-table Scottish Premiership clash. Everyone knows Celtic are going to win the title anyway, regardless of the anomalies of the early-season league table.
No, this is an act of vengeance, a dishing out of rough justice.
It’s just a few days since Hibs manager Neil Lennon was struck by a coin thrown from the home fans at Tynecastle during a scoreless Edinburgh derby. Lennon had goaded the Hearts supporters behind his dugout after a disallowed goal for the home team.
The fallout broke along similar lines to previous incidents involving Lennon: one side that he was the victim of sickening sectarianism, the other that he brought it on himself with his foolhardy belligerence.
It’s no surprise which side the Celtic support take on the latest controversy involving their hugely popular former player and manager, but it’s not just a coin that has them riled up, or the graffiti outside Tynecastle that read ‘Hang Neil Lennon’.
Lennon’s Friday press conference before Hibs’ game with St Johnstone is front page news on Saturday morning and Celtic fans heading to their game would have read his thoughts with relish.
“I’ve been subjected to this for 18 years. I’m 47, I’m fed up of it,” Lennon said.
“You call it sectarianism here in Scotland, I call it racism. If a black man is abused, you are not just abusing the colour of his skin, you are abusing his culture, his heritage, his background.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
“It’s the exact same when I get called a Fenian, a pauper, a beggar, a tarrier. These people with the sense of entitlement or superiority complex. And all I do is stand up for myself.”
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
We are staying in Edinburgh and get a lift to the match with Denis Boyle, a friend of my father’s, his cousin Barry Ward, and Barry’s son Daniel. They are both second generation Donegal immigrants whose people hail from the same neck of the woods as myself. For most of the way along the M8 toward Glasgow’s East End, the talk is of what Lennon said.
I tell them his comments ring true with the man I got to know through his work as a TV pundit: passionate, articulate and fiercely intelligent. They say that he has articulated their real lived experience, a Scotland in which anti-Irish bigotry persists and is couched, as Lennon suggests, in the language of supremacism.
Their worldview explains why Celtic still matters even as the club’s status as a European football power has long since waned. My father, a Scottish Catholic of mixed Irish and Italian ancestry, doesn’t hold much with nationalism.
He doesn’t feel Scottish or British, and he doesn’t feel Irish either. Celtic has always been his identity. The great football clubs always represent something bigger, and while their fans may sing songs of Ireland, in truth Celtic is a nation unto itself, a place to belong for people whose old home couldn’t have them, and whose new one didn’t want them.
Like many of their kind in the 131 years since Celtic was founded to raise money to feed starving Irish immigrants, Denis and Barry have done well in a country that was once so hostile to their ancestors. Generations educated in Catholic schools have formed a solid middle class and the worst excesses of religious discrimination in workplaces and professions are no more.
And yet there Lennon is, a successful Irish catholic calling out a society in which he can be called “a Fenian, a pauper, a beggar, a tarrier”, and still be criticised for bringing it upon himself.
Lennon’s comments chime with what these days are called ‘identity politics’. His point is that talk of ‘sectarianism’, with its both-sides-as-bad-as-each-other inference, ignores the bigger picture of a victimised minority group and hostile dominant culture.
The problem with identity politics is that the group in question is often able to excuse itself of taking responsibility for its own failings. Celtic supporters may sing songs that glorify murderous Irish Republicanism as a response to the bloodthirsty sectarian chants of their Rangers rivals, but they embarrass the club nonetheless.
Yet when you put the fact that the majority of all religiously-motivated hate crimes in Scotland are committed against Catholics, according to Scottish government figures published this year, alongside the long list of threats and acts of violence visited upon Lennon, a picture begins to merge of something deeply sinister, attitudes and actions that tally with racism and intolerance on the rise far beyond Scotland; the kind of stuff James McClean is dealing with right now in the latest iteration of his poppy saga.
“There’s a problem. It’s a big problem,” said Lennon last Friday. “And you all turn your back on it, you all laugh about it, and brush it aside. It’s right there. I keep hearing all this ‘One Scotland’, we are open to everyone. At times it hasn’t been the case to me.”
These might well be the most stinging of Lennon’s words, and the ones we should all heed.
Post-Brexit referendum, Scotland sees itself as smarter, better, and more welcoming than their English neighbours immersed in self-destructive fear and loathing. But as with the strange stirrings that our own presidential election threw up here, dark forces are often hidden only by a veneer of tolerance.
With Hearts beaten, Denis decants to a Christy Moore concert in Glasgow and Barry takes us back to Edinburgh. Our two boys snooze in the back seat and Barry tunes into the radio phone-ins.
Soon talk turns to whether Lennon would return to Celtic as manager someday. Should you ever go back? We’re not sure. Nonetheless, Barry says “I love Lenny, for all his flaws; I love everything he stands for.”
Why not? All he does is stand up for himself.
© Irish Examiner Ltd. All rights reserved
GFTB-aw naw Weebawbabity has got to you????
Bankiebhoy1
Tommy Martin CSC
HH
Good read ta.
I was Blind
Red Bull Leipzig went for it early doors against us, they wanted it Big Time.
Brilliant Celtic Won with sheer Willpower, Desire and Love for the Celtic Shirt.
Brendan is a Genius.
Bombay cottage for dinner,I recommend the chicken chatt ?
Beachball
The Almighty look after and make sure All of the Brave Brave undaunted Celts going to the factory of hate Njoi the day in the only way they can.
Something inside so strong.
Thursday night has got to be the best all round performance by Celtic since Brendan became manager. We have come along way since Lincoln Red Imps. Hh
Petec-thought you where at day out?
Fairhill Bhoy 8.07pm
Was hoping you might have joined Marspapa today ….. as per usual I was only out for a few hours and even though the BV & Mcchuils are 2 pubs in the toon that I would only venture into through CQN, was an enjoyable few hours… always good to put a face to a moniker makes the blog real life :-)
GORDON64-it was a good show,but still think our performance against BM last time was better ?Apart from result obviously ?
fairhill bhoy on 10th November 2018 8:30 pm
Petec-thought you where at day out?
………………………………..
It is obvious I wisnae there – been on here All day.
Why you ask me that question is a bigger… och been through this p!sh so many times before.
Happiness
GFTB-to many ding dong battles with people on here ,maybe next time mate?
MARSPAPA-will be the nicest guy you will ever meet bye the way!EVER EVER??
Peter-sorry mate,I watched that game and a load more today,right back to 1980 cup final?
#lazyIpaddayinbedtillwifecomeshome?
I got 5 on it
FB,
Thats Coolio
Michelle the Fifer what a Babe in that Movie.
Fairhillbhoy, was hearing good things about you from an absolute gentleman, gonna ask you something, ask big jack mcgilveray wgst he thinks of me , if you don’t like what you hear fair do , if you do me you and the absolute gentleman MARSPA hopefully can meet for a drink , ps had a absolutely brilliant day with cqn ghuys each and everyone fantastic people GFTB thank you mate
Ok
Can we start the Poppy debate now that the ‘transfer window fiasco ‘ “Brendan leaving ” and “Lawwell is the devil incarnate/ aw naw he isnae ” debates seem to have subsided somewhat.
Fairhill Bhoy 8.41pm
Ding ding battles on the inter web don’t matter in real life :-)
Petec-that 5:1 was an old one ?
Was hoping for lubo’s baptism off fire ???
When I was a student I worked in a Duntocher pub, real auld boozer, a no–nonsense shoppe, great times , incredible laffs and hair-raising scrapes. Legendary lock-ins.
Lookin’ back think I got a better education behind the bar than I did on Gilmorehill.
Anyone swearing and abusing the punters or drunk ( often both) was papped oot , rapid.
Repeat offenders were discouraged quietly.
What is the Stars,
Did BSR’s horse win Today?
No doubt a Horse born soon will have that name. :))))))
GERRYFAETHEBRIG on 10TH NOVEMBER 2018 8:57 PM
Fairhill Bhoy 8.41pm
Ding ding battles on the inter web don’t matter in real life :-)
…………………………………………………………………………………………….
Jeremy Kyle has made a very good living out of intertweb spats me thinks ;-)
GFTB-watched the centenary year today ,I love my iPad
Would like to say thanks to all the bhoys i met at the hoot today , in particular TRAVELOUR
watching Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy – I knew it was the russians!!!
TET-Very good you auld cynic ???
Posted too quick there meant to say TRAVELLERBHOY ! He was great company today god bless him !!
FB
Auld & cynical, aye you know me so well :-)
Fairhill Bhoy 9.02pm
Will have a look, Dallas from this parish directed me to “Irvinebhoy” on utube some great stuff from around “our time”
TET 9.00pm Jeremy Kyle could have a field day with CQN although by all accounts I might be Jereny’s star pupil :-)
Weebawbabbity, delighted to meet you & D today, the CQN get togethers bring all sorts of people from near and far, but with one thing in common ….. Celtic
Weebawbabity-don’t know a jack,marspapa is a star,I’ve knew that for 30yrs?
Magical
The Almighty he works in so very mysterious ways.
Callum said that he wanted to be the CAPTAIN of Celtic. My Dad always admits when he is wrong by making a kind joke. I honestly couldnae see Callum being the Celtic Captain – I can noo.
There really is something Burning deep inside so many of the Current Celtic players.
BRENDAN RODGERS is ok @ what he does.
hey bhoys can I ask a favour, know some of you are not animal lovers, but can you spare a thought for Jorge the west highland terrier we adopted, think I told you his owner Annette was diagnosed with inoperable brain cancer a few months ago, well she is in a coma now not expected to last over the weekend, but Jorge has caught kennel cough and is not responding to treatment not drinking or eating for 3 days now. is it the fact his owner is so close to death don’t know but he looks so poorly hh’ thanks for listening.
TET-would love to have a beer ??
Bedtime
GFTB
A fair few worse than you on here, trust me on that ;-)