The principle problem in the first half is the same Celtic have had for a year – they are unable to pass through a press. Roma are simply better at the press than Dundee, so the consequences last night were more acute. In the opening minutes, the visitors had six players in their forward third when Celtic attempted to play out from the back. It worked.
A team’s ability to play out is determined by shape and ball control. Wilfried Nancy learned lots during the opening 45+ minutes on his new side’s capacity in these areas.
Mercifully, Roma dropped the pace in the second half, however, Nancy changed several things which suggests he learned from that opening period. As you and I discussed earlier this week, Auston Trusty and Liam Scales should be moved one place to the left of where they were against Hearts and in the opening period against Roma. Trusty in the middle, Scales left and Kieran Tierney hooked for Colby Donovan. I expect a lesson has been learned and that’s the last we will see of Auston on the right of a back three.
Wilfried must be wondering what all the fuss is about Daizen Maeda. He now knows Daizen is not a striker (you and I discussed this on Tuesday). Our MVP from last season was also hooked at halftime for the return of Kelechi Iheanacho. I hadn’t hoped we would see 45 minutes from Kelechi for a few weeks yet, but from his first to last touch, you could see what a difference playing with an actual striker makes. Another lesson was learned and fitness issues aside, I doubt we will see Daizen through the middle again.
Benjamin Nygren’s goal contributions have been a big part of our story so far this season but he clearly put his boots on the wrong feet last night. The introduction of the correctly attired Paulo Bernardo improved our ball control enormously. He played deeper than Nygren. This subtle change of shape gave Callum McGregor more options and freed Reo Hatate to have a good second half. The Portuguese did very well considering he was parachuted into such an environment from the wilderness.
Improvements to shape and ball control happened sooner than expected. Napoleon, who 200 years ago conquered Rome, said, “I would rather have a lucky general than a good one.” Better still to have a general who learns fast.
Yesterday we spoke about Roma being a free hit with low expectations and the lesser game of our week. Tomorrow we will talk about the cup final, and a chance to write history.
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So funny IMHO
https://stvfootagesales.tv/content/baxter-and-logan-comedy-sketch/
Clunks – fair enough. But Rugby Park?
I get proximity for the home team, but unless we had no say in the matter, we shouldn’t be willing to go anywhere near that pitch.
The Blogger Formerly Known As GM on 12th December 2025 8:00 pm
Clunks – fair enough. But Rugby Park?
I get proximity for the home team, but unless we had no say in the matter, we shouldn’t be willing to go anywhere near that pitch.
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their homr tie. nothing to do with celtic.
sensible pricing and they will make a fortune,
Fair enough if thems the rules.
BelmontBrian on 12th December 2025 7:57 pm
I remember those shows. My God it was so long ago!
https://x.com/i/status/1999222459292332286
Trump FC
NotSoHappyCelticLass💚🍀🏴🇵🇸
@HappyCelticLass
Celtic have now banned @CynicWomen and The Celtic Star from the @CelticFCWomen
press conferences and taken away their accreditation. The fan media that attend the games do so much more for the women’s game than the club do. It’s dreadful.
8:59 pm · 11 Dec 2025
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67K Views
The walls are closing in. . . . ..
The current board is charting a direct course for a Soviet-style collapse.
Like the Politburo elders in 1991—isolated, deluded by their own propaganda, and blind to the groundswell beneath them, they are retreating into the bunker.
They will soon find themselves huddled in a backroom, staring at empty spreadsheets that contradict their rosy forecasts, desperately debating whether to double down on a failing strategy or to execute a midnight evacuation.
Give us a wave lads!
533 followers.
The algos can do some wonderful stuff.
Since purging all “Celtic fan media” from my socials, new channels I’ve never heard of keep popping up.
It’s like wack-a-mole.
It reminds me of the golden rule of commodity investing: the cure for high prices is high prices.
From jobo thanks hh
*SENTINEL CELTS PLAYER OF THE YEAR 2025-26*
*RESULTS FROM GAME #26 CELTIC 0 ROMA 3*
Good evening, friends.
Before the game there was little doubt in my mind that Wilfried would play a system that was very similar to his first game. Although I didn’t expect him to start with an unchanged team. That was surprise number one. Surprise number two was that we couldn’t even manage to win the coin toss and found ourselves shooting the ‘wrong way’ in the first half. My third surprise was a pleasant one – 2 minutes into the game and a throw in to Celtic which was taken by Yang – can’t remember the last time that a shy wasn’t taken by a defender! Come on, we are looking for wee signs of progress, surely?
The game got underway and was a bit messy to start with, each side failing to string too many passes together. But there were only 5 minutes on the clock when, from a corner, Scales peeled off the guy he was originally marking to challenge another Roma player in the air and bullet the ball into our his net. What’s happened to our early POTY leader?
We were then pretty much battered for the next half hour. One obvious new tactic was Kasper’s distributions, mainly down the centre of the park. In the main, Kasper did his part of the equation OK, firing the ball towards Maeda or Nygren but neither of those receivers did what we hoped they could do, receive the ball, control it and lay it off to our attacking midfielders or wingers. Nygren in particular was statuesque in these matters, regularly waiting on the ball reaching him rather than taking a couple of steps towards it. And so we had wave upon wave of Roma pressure, albeit with not too many clear chances being created.
But on 35 minutes Roma doubled their lead, and grudgingly deservedly so. 2 of their players progressed down the right with only Tierney there to try to cover the 2 of them. An easy cut across to our 6 yard box was knocked home for number 2.
A couple of minutes later we saw Celtic’s only good move of the first half. Close interchanges down the right involving Engels, Yang, Nygren and Hatate found Reo in on goal but from 12 yards his effort went over the bar.
Only 1 minute of stoppage time was announced and I was readying myself to boil the kettle thinking that we had probably escaped with only being 2 down. But Roma’s Ferguson had other ideas. Receiving a ball in the box with his back to goal he controlled, swivelled and shot across Schmeichel into the far corner of the net to put Roma out of sight. And yet we were thrown a potential lifeline just seconds after the restart when Engels was pulled to the ground for a clear penalty. If there is such a thing as a good missed penalty then Arne’s was it. Hard and low heading into the bottom corner, it came off the inside of the post and across to safety.
Wilfried rang the half time changes and so that was a positive sign. Donovan for Tierney gave the 3 at the back better balance, with Scales and Trusty both moving one place to their left. Bernardo for Nygren was a significant upgrade (then again, even just taking Nygren off might have improved our chances)! And Iheanacho coming on was another positive although personally I’d not have replaced Maeda, but instead hooked Tounekti and played Daizen out left, his best position.
The changes did make a difference though, particularly with our goal threats. In 52 minutes Hatate broke down the left and curled a great pass across to the inrushing Iheanacho but, under pressure from a Roma defender Kelechi clipped his effort just wide. Arguably, in the previous 7 minutes of play we could have been only 2-3 behind. But on such small margins….
On the hour mark, Ralston came on for Yang suggesting that we were maybe adding extra cover on the right rather than trying to create further chances. Tony did alright during his time on the pitch.
In the 64th minute I finally had something to cheer about, if only for about 90 seconds. A Celtic corner had come to nothing (as usual) but Hatate picked up the ball outside the box and spotted Engels (the corner taker) on the right. Reo’s through pass split the defence, Arne crossed first time and Iheanacho glanced the ball home and, briefly, there was hope. But when the VAR lines were finally drawn it showed that he was a good yard offside. 10 minutes later and a similar outcome at the other end. Scrappy tussles on the half way line broke Roma’s way and the ball was played into a busy penalty box where some of our defenders decided to stand off rather than challenge. A shot was fired into the top corner but subsequently we saw that there was an offside earlier in the build up, this time by about half a ba’ hair! But offside is offside.
Balikwisha replaced Hatate with 15 minutes left and while we still tried to get some sort of consolation from the game it eventually petered out as a 3 nil defeat.
Now, I’m still not pressing any panic buttons with regard to our new manager. He had very little time before playing the league leaders and was then up against a formidable side in Roma. Before last night’s match the majority view from folk I spoke with was that getting anything from the game would have been a bonus. Just like Midtjylland, we were 3 nil down at half time but, as in that earlier game at least it didn’t get any worse!
A lot of preparation is now required before Sunday’s cup final. I hope that our starting 11 for that game is more like the one we finished with last night.
We have now played 26 games, and have won 14, drawn 6 and lost 6. We have scored 43 goals and conceded 24.
As for the voting numbers, despite our loss I’m really delighted that 77 folk made the effort to voice their opinions and have generated another £3 donation to CHAS.
The total votes cast for each player are as follows, with my own nominations asterisked. For this game I’ve again listed the players in a 3-5-1-1 formation.
Schmeichel*: 4
Trusty: 15
Scales: 1
Tierney: 8
Yang: 16
McGregor: 15
Engels: 2
Nygren: 0
Tounekti: 0
Hatate*: 44
Maeda: 2
Iheanacho: 66
Bernardo: 37
Donovan: 20
Ralston: 0
Balikwisha: 1
Unused substitutes: Doohan, Kenny, McCowan, Murray, Sinisalo
And so, the POINTS earned by each player for the Roma game are as follows –
25 points: Iheanacho
22 points: Hatate
19 points: Bernardo
16 points: Donovan
14 points: Yang
12 points each: McGregor and Trusty
10 points: Tierney
9 points: Schmeichel
8 points each: Engels and Maeda
6 points each: Balikwisha and Scales
3 points: Nygren, Ralston, Tounekti
1 point: Doohan, Kenny, McCowan, Murray, Sinisalo
And the cumulative points achieved after 26 games played are now –
413: Scales
359: McGregor
283: Tierney
281: Hatate
273: Engels
245: Tounekti
238: Maeda
231: Nygren
219: Schmeichel
203: Trusty
183: Donovan
182: Forrest
168: Yang
166: Iheanacho
165: McCowan
158: Carter-Vickers and Saracchi
127: Kenny and Ralston
91: Bernardo
82: Murray
69: Balikwisha
60: Johnston
49: Yamada
40: Osmand, Sinisalo
22: Inamura
19: Idah
10: Simpson-Pusey
5: Doohan
1: Hale and Isiguso
0: All the other players who’ve not yet made a matchday squad!
Our next game is at 3.30pm on Sunday and a chance to claim the first domestic silverware of the season when we face St Mirren in the final of the League Cup. If we were to succeed it would be our 120th domestic trophy in our history.
Hail Hail!
Just checked.
I have 228 followers and hardly post anything.
Aren’t they lucky.
Quality over quantity.
You should try it👍
You should try that on here.
Ouch.
I’m guessing Chat GPT must have gone down.
MOM
Had three interactions with that guy, conclusion not that bright!
Mr Mclaughlin
aiways liked a bit of our Francise I suggest we play his wig up front on Sunday
Prestonpans bhoys on 12th December 2025 10:13 pm
There are a few on here who match that description.
They seem to have an overinflated sense of their own impotence.
Tom Mc L
Re Odin Thiago Holm.
https://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/2126142/Celtic-Odin-Holm-health-calf-injury
A bizarre illness Tom.sadly we did not get to see a lot of him.
HH
“Had three interactions with that guy, conclusion not that bright!”
Let he who is without sin…..
You really have a problem with constructive sentences, take if you didn’t get that comp o higher but a complete fail, cheerio eegit!
Paulo Bernado was hitting the top corner, slotting the ball into the inside netting in the warm ups last night and never missed, he just looks so cool, why is he not starting. Doesn’t make sense to me. Reo is a great player, when he can be bothered, but Bernado needs to get a run.
I rest my case.
I agree about Berdardo, but I would keep Reo and Rest Arne.
Whit case are you compiling , anyway have spent enough time interacting with you!
Jim Spence
@JimSpenceDundee
“If he’d been in Scotland the SNP would know if he was praying. They’ve mastered the art of knowing when someone is praying silently in his head😎”
https://x.com/JimSpenceDundee/status/1998841775482458569#m
And to think of the amount of dumb Tims who actually vote for these “Protestant Supremacy” enthusiasts as well too! lol
A Timdom that voted for anti-Women, anti-Children, anti-Catholic, pro-Drag/Queen, political scumbags, is NOT a Timdom anymore.
Maybe the appointment of Wilf to play the dumb ass is the PLC’s 1st steps to ‘crush’ the club and then sell it off to some internet malware company to be flogged at some drunken hedonistic Casino on some unreachable website?! lol.
Who knows!
BUT.
When Daddy Desmond emptied his seat at halftime along with tens of thousands of others.
His son Ross’s sneering lofty landlordish face as the boooooos rang out at fulltime was a window into their pretendy Tim souls!
https://x.com/s__max_/status/1999238158240874970
Who knows what these people are capable of.
HH
oot.
It’s their minions that i am worried about, many of them missing on here today.
celt55 on 12th December 2025 10:36 pm
I agree about Berdardo, but I would keep Reo and Rest Arne.
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Engels would still be in my team, i dont think he gets enough protection or something to play his game, always getting studded. Bernado can sit in there and mop up.
Cals been nullified in the last 2 games and it looked like a craig levein Scotland team last night at times with 6 in the midfield in a straight line across the Park, our wing backs not knowing whether to stick or twist so they just twisted and the whole team was all over the place nobody doubling up and helping.
Tounekti left on the wing on his own then having nobody to cross it into when he got it, or nobody to help him out, so i am not blaming him for anything.
A chopped off Var, a missed penalty, and a few sclaffed missed chances in the box, and at least 3 chances to shoot from just outside the box says were not too far away from something happening. fix the defence and forwards. Ramble over ..
Was Auchinleck able to make that decision unilaterally?
I’d be disappointed if we agreed to play at Rugby Park.
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dont like that decision.
they should have been allowed to play it at their home ground.
it cant have been anything to do with the ticket situation, we get 650 tickets at hearts, 1100 at aberdeen etc etc so thats not the problem
but at least i will get a ticket for the game.
still not right though
Auchinleck might not have a box to seat directors , and therefore our directors would not have been safe .
TT
I assume because Rugby Park is set up for VAR .. it will be used in the cup tie?
Auchinleck might not have a box to seat directors , and therefore our directors would not have been safe .
—
that might be closer to the truth!
I assume because Rugby Park is set up for VAR .. it will be used in the cup tie?
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cant be that or they would have said right away that it couldnt be played there.
‘there’ as in auchinlecks home ground
Say aye tae a Killie Pie!
The best in the fitba world…
Allegedly
so its now been peddled that its the fault of celtic fans that auchinleck cant play at their ground.
what a lot of shite.
are 20000 ticketless celtic fans going to go to deepest darkest ayrshire for a 5.30 sunday night kick off and try charge in?
utter shite.
if thats the polices excuse then they would ask hearts to move our games against them to murrayfield because we only get 650 tickets for tynecastle.
police making decisions and blaming celtic fans for something that is a month away so hasnt, or wouldnt have happened
this has collusion between our board and the cops written all over it.
Taking all Celtic Media from your appliances ?Jesus.,a bit Third Reich there.Should get Burnley and the rest of the Boardellos,and start burning things,criticizing the Board,even if its only complaining about the price of the Pies..That’s the way to stamp out all this huiiabaloo from the rabble.
Down with this sort of thing.That’s what I always say.Harumph !!!! 😑😑😑