“I felt that if I went back and reflected on the last six months of 2016 that we had, everything has gone really, really well, mapping out from June when I first came in and seeing the fixture list when it came out I felt this was going to be an important period for us especially if we could progress how I hoped we would progress,” reflected Brendan Rodgers as his side’s mid-season break in Dubai came to an end.
“We’ve had a good period but we want more. If we are going to be better that means improving our game, improving the levels of our game and to keep pushing.
“That’s been our clear message since we’ve been here. The players have been fantastic.”
We will have strategies to guard against that complacency. I don’t think it’s in the mentality of the group now. “That was something we nailed from the very first day.
“They are absolutely giving everything. The attitude and mental fitness is now strong.
“Pre-season, I talked about reclaiming that working mentality, to work and to have this mindset that allows you to win games and win in the style that we want to win them in.
But there are still areas. We need to create more chances,’ stressed Rodgers.
“My philosophy is non-negotiable: we attack,” stated the Irishman. “But we can defend better to allow us to attack more. So here this week we are talking about creating more pressure with speed, power and aggression in our game we can create more chances through defending better in better moments, as a collective.
“Those are areas we have to work on tactically. Technically there is a level we can be better in but the players are ready, they are soaking it up in order to be the best they can be. That’s what you want.”
Over the weekend CQN was busy reviewing Brendan’s season so far. The site had some server issues on Saturday so for those who missed the report here it is. We’ve taken the story, so far up to end of November and have still to report more fully on December’s grueling schedule which brought 8 victories and a draw away to Manchester City in the Champions League in a match we were unlucky not to win. Here goes…
WITHOUT a ball being kicked in anger, Brendan Rodgers began putting his Celtic jigsaw together.
The Irishman, a boyhood Hoops fan, studied videos and DVDs of the team during Ronny Deila’s two-year reign and wasted no time in kicking off his revolution.
Rodgers was not impressed at the lack of cover for Leigh Griffiths in the striking department and was aware the club had relied far too heavily on last season’s 40-goal hitman.
Drastic action needed to be taken swiftly and the new boss didn’t hesitate as he released Colin Kazim-Richards, Carlton Cole and Anthony Stokes and sold £2.3 million flop Stefan Scepovic to Getafe for less that half the initial outlay.
That allowed him to concentrate on bringing in French kid Moussa Dembele, only 19 at the time, on a four-year deal after paying a £500,000 development fee to Fulham.
Rodgers, who had been out of football since leaving Liverpool in October 2015, had liked the look of the powerful youngster who had scored 17 goals in the Championship the previous term.
He then switched his attention to central defence and the back-up support to the attack. The astute gaffer realised the heart of the rearguard needed experience and he set about luring his former Liverpool defender Kolo Toure, who, at 35, had been released by the Anfield club in the summer.
Scott Sinclair was a player he had never forgotten after working with him at Chelsea and Swansea and he was determined to get the 27-year-old left-sided raider to the east end of Glasgow.
Relegated Aston Villa were in no rush to part with the flamboyant attacker, but Rodgers dug in and his bid – that is likely to rise to £4.5million with add-ons – was eventually accepted just before the opening Premiership encounter of the season against Hearts at Tynecastle on August 7.
The new boss also insisted on a busy midfield and Kris Commons, who relied on grace and guile, clearly didn’t figure in his plans, despite being a massive favourite with the fans.
Stefan Johansen had been making noises about moving to England and his wish was granted when he was shifted to Fulham in a £2million deal.
It wouldn’t be long before Swiss Under-21 international right-back Saidy Janko would be joining the Norwegian in the Championship after the defender endured a torrid time in the final Champions League qualifier against Hapeol Be’er Sheva as the Hoops went down 2-0 in Israel, but scraped through 5-4 on aggregate.
The former Manchester United starlet was on his way to Barnsley on a season-long loan deal two days later.
Rodgers replaced him with Cristian Gamboa at the cost of £1million from West Brom where the Costa Rican international had been shunned by Hawthorns gaffer Tony Pulis for the best part of a year.
In midfield, though, the former Merseyside gaffer concentrated on getting the best out of what he had inherited and it didn’t take him long to discover Stuart Armstrong was not a wide player and his strength and skill was better suited to a role in the middle of the park.
James Forrest, going nowhere in Deila’s last season at the club, impressed in pre-season and was rewarded with a four-year extension.
Rodgers experienced the competitive debut from hell on July 12 when Celtic slid to an awful 1-0 defeat to the semi-professionals of Lincoln Red Imps in Gibraltar in the first of the team’s six Champions League qualifiers.
The manager remained calm and said: “Of course, you never want to lose the game.
“You let the local team have their night, we press on, another week’s training and we’ll be better for it.
“There is no embarrassment. We never took our chances and they took theirs. The second leg will be different.”
Eight days later, the Hoops responded with a 3-0 second leg triumph in the east end of Glasgow with Griffiths, Patrick Roberts and Mikael Lustig on the scoresheet.
Next up in Europe, were Kazakhstan champions Astana, who proved to be a handful. Griffiths netted again to give the visitors a valuable 1-1 draw and the lively frontman slotted in a penalty-kick to give the champions the lead in Glasgow in the return.
However, after dominating proceedings, the home side gifted Astana a shock equaliser in the second-half and it was nail-biting stuff before substitute Moussa Dembele scored his first goal for the club with a last-gasp spot-kick to send the club towards the final hurdle.
Rodgers was now only three hours away from achieving something his predecessor Deila had failed to deliver in two years – lead Celtic into the money-spinning Champions League group stages.
He watched his team take control of the first tie against Hapoel Be’er Sheva at Parkhead as they scored five goals, courtesy of Griffiths, with a double, Tom Rogic, Dembele and skipper Scott Brown.
Worryingly, though, the visitors snatched a quickfire double to keep the pressure on for the second leg a week later. They scored two and Craig Gordon saved a crucial penalty-kick and the Hoops were through to Europe’s elite once again.
In the Premiership, the champions had got off to a perfect start when a smart low shot from the rejuvenated Forrest gave them the lead against Hearts in Edinburgh, but Jamie Walker wiped that out with a controversial penalty-kick.
It was left to new Bhoy Sinclair to have the final say in the fading moments when he raced more than half the length of the field to get on the end of a cute Griffiths’ left-wing cross to divert in the winner.
After a 4-2 win over St Johnstone in Perth, Celtic brought down the curtain for the league in August with a 4-1 win over Aberdeen at Parkhead.
It was the Celtic supporters’ first glimpse of new goalkeeper Dorus de Vries with the 35-year-old Dutchman agreeing to join up with his his ex-Swansea boss in Glasgow. A fee of £400,000 persuaded Nottingham Forest to part with their Player of the Year.
Unfortunately, he didn’t keep a clean sheet on his debut, but his new team coasted to a 4-1 triumph with goals from Rogic, Forrest, Sinclair and Griffiths.
The Betfred League Cup campaign had already got underway with an emphatic 5-0 home victory over Motherwell on Wednesday, August 10, with Sinclair on the scoresheet again. Rogic (2) and the increasingly-impressive Dembele (2) chipped in with the others.
EXUBERANCE and endurance are never far away in the world of football as Celtic discovered within four days in September.
On September 10, Brendan Rodgers led the champions to a breathtaking 5-1 triumph over their Ibrox opponents, a victory that had Parkhead rocking to its foundations with a home support celebrating big style.
The next confrontation turned out to be a different ball-game altogether. The opening Champions League group game against the mighty Barcelona at the Nou Camp beckoned and the Hoops were about to go into the history books.
Alas, for all the wrong reasons. Lionel Messi, Neymar and Luis Suarez proved to be unstoppable as the Catalans pulverised their way to a 7-0 triumph – the worst result Celtic had ever suffered in European competition.
Ironically, the previous worst was at the same ground three years earlier as Neil Lennon’s men were bombarded 6-1.
The Premiership meeting with Sevco Rangers was a much more enjoyable occasion for the Hoops fans!
There was drama even before the kick-off when top scorer Leigh Griffiths failed a late fitness test and Rodgers handed the main striking role to Moussa Dembele.
The 20-year-old attacker, without a league goal to his name and still awaiting his call-up to the French Under-21 international squad, had the performance players can only dream about – the perfect hat-trick as the Hoops ran amok.
Dembele netted with a header and right and left foot shots to pile the misery on the visitors. There was a brief flutter when Joe Garner pulled one back, but normal service was swiftly resumed.
The curtain came down with Sinclair, scoring in his fourth successive Premiership game, and the on-fire Stuart Armstrong, a second-half substitute for Nir Bitton, sliding shots beyond the bewildered and overworked Wes Foderingham.
A delighted Rodgers observed: “The occasion was everything I expected – and more.”
Unfortunately, the tables were turned in Barcelona when Dorus de Vries conceded seven with Messi firing in the first in the opening minutes after the Hoops defence went to sleep at a left-wing corner-kick.
Dembele, hat-trick hero at the weekend, scorned the opportunity of a leveller from the penalty spot and, a couple of minutes later, Messi plonked a second beyond De Vries.
The floodgates were opened shortly after the turnaround when Brazilian Neymar scored with a long-range free-kick that swirled over the hands of Celtic’s new keeper, looking far from impressive in only his third game for the club.
Four more efforts were tucked into the Celtic net – with Messi completing his hat-trick – as they collapsed under the incessant onslaught from the classy Spaniards.
Undoubtedly, the result was a shattering blow to Rodgers and his players, including Cristian Gamboa who made his debut at right-back that evening. There have been better first appearances!
A few days later, the Hoops travelled to Inverness to take on Caley Thistle who had become a bit of a jinx team to the Glasgow giants and managers such as John Barnes, Martin O’Neill, Neil Lennon and Ronny Deila.
Would Brendan Rodgers be included in the list? Celtic dominated virtually from start to finish and, after hitting the woodwork three times and being repelled by an inspired goalkeeper, were leading 2-1 in stoppage time with goals from Sinclair and Rogic.
The Highlanders tried one last thrust as the Hoops defence didn’t pick up the second ball following a free-kick. A cross was flighted in from the right and substitute Alex Fisher was unmarked as he guided a header wide of the scrambling De Vries.
Celtic’s perfect league record ended in that instant. Undoubtedly, a lesson was learned.
Progress in the Betfred League Cup was maintained when the battling part-timers Alloa went down 2-0 with late goals from Forrest and Dembele.
The game saw the return to goal of Craig Gordon, but he was on the bench again the following weekend when Kilmarnock were the visitors.
De Vries, after conceding a remarkable 40-yard goal, was injured and remained in the dressing room at the interval. Gordon reappeared, Celtic won 6-1 and the shotstopper has been there ever since.
The curtain came down in September on Wednesday the 28th when Pep Guardiola’s multi-millionaires of Manchester City, unbeaten in England, arrived in town for the second Champions League confrontation of Group C.
Amazingly, Rodgers’ side led three times with a double from the ever-improving Dembele and a single from Kieran Tierney, but the home side had to settle for a point in a 3-3 stalemate.
It had been a massive improvement on the previous outing in the catalan capital.
CELTIC suffered one defeat in six games in three different trophies in October – and that solitary loss cost them their chance of making progress into the Champions League knock-out stages.
On the plus side, Sevco Rangers were dismissed in the Berfred League Cup semi-final on the Hoops’ way to their 100th silverware success – and the first in the Brendan Rodgers regime.
The Hoops will look back on the Wednesday evening of October 19 in the east end of Glasgow as the setback from which their European aspirations never recovered.
Borussia Monchengladbach provided the opposition and boss Rodgers knew a victory was imperative with Barcelona and Manchester City tipped by many as already in the top two positions in the so-called Group of Death.
That left it between the Scottish champions and the Bundesliga outfit, who were displaying some indifferent form at home, to slug it out for the Europa League place.
The first-half ended goalless, but there was a real calamity for the hosts when veteran defender Kolo Toure gifted the Germans the opening goal that silenced a packed Parkhead.
And, to make matters worse, the Ivory Coast legend then gave away a second goal when he lost possession and Craig Gordon had no chance as the visitors broke forward to smash the ball into the roof of the net.
Toure was crestfallen afterwards. He said: “I’m 35 years old and I gave away two goals a 16 year old would be ashamed of.”
Four days later at Hampden, the veteran defender was on the subs’ bench as Rodgers went with Jozo Simunovic and Erik Sviatchenko for the meeting with the Ibrox side with a place against Aberdeen in the Betfred League Cup Final up for grabs.
The Dons had already made sure of their place in the showdown by overcoming a difficult Morton side in the semi-final.
A late goal from Moussa Dembele, swiftly becoming the scourge of the Ibrox side following his hat-trick in the Premiership game the previous month, gave the Hoops a much-deserved victory.
The scoreline looked narrow, but the gulf between the two clubs at the national stadium was obvious for all to see.
Sevco keeper Matt Gilks put in the performance of a lifetime as he repelled the champions time and again.
His goal bore a charmed life as shots and headers rained in. Referee Craig Thomson wrongly ruled out a header from Sviatchenko that soared beyond the shotstopper.
The match official indicated a push by the Dane on Clint Hill, but TV pictures clearly showed he made a mistake.
It didn’t matter in the end when substitute Leigh Griffiths got the better of Lee Wallace to set up Dembele and, with the neatest of flicks, he sent the ball zooming through the legs of Gilks.
Rodgers declared the win was every bit as impressive as the 5-1 victory in the league. He said: “It was just the goals. I think that was pretty clear.
“We had that same performance, but we just didn’t finish off the opportunities.
“Some of that was through the goalkeeper, but we again showed the mentality in the team, they kept going, didn’t get disappointed, had great discipline and eventually got the reward which they deserved.”
Celtic, after wins over Dundee (1-0), Motherwell (2-0) and Ross County (4-0), brought the curtain down on another entrancing, intriguing month with a 1-0 victory over Aberdeen in the Betfred League Cup Final dress rehearsal.
Tom Rogic scored a sublime goal that was well worthy of the three points as the champions continued to storm towards six title in a row.
CELTIC became Silverware Centurians on the Sunday afternoon of November 27 when Brendan Rodgers led the Hoops to their milestone 100th trophy success in the 3-0 victory over Aberdeen.
The Hoops were rampant as they made history at Hampden with a spectacular attacking display that swept aside the Dons.
Tom Rogic lived up to his Wizard of Oz title when he curled in a magnificent breakthrough goal in the 16th minute.
The Aussie international, another player responding to the promptings of his manager, cut in from the right and left keeper Joe Lewis helpless with an effort that found the bottom right-hand corner of the net.
In the 37th minute, James Forrest doubled the advantage when he finished off a mesmerising solo run with a belter of a shot and once again the Dons No.1 was left helpless.
It was all over in the 64th minute after Anthony O’Connor hauled down Forrest and Celtic were awarded a stonewall penalty-kick.
Moussa Dembele was the picture of composure as he rolled the ball into the net.
An elated Rodgers said: “My players have been really impressive.
“They must now build on this success. It’s a winning club, that’s what the history of this club has been based on.
“It marks a milestone, the century of trophies, and now we must start off the next century of trophies.
“That will be important for us and the club.
“It’s a great night for Celtic supporters to celebrate and we will push for the next one.
“It’s six months and a week since I came in and we talked about what we wanted to achieve and how we wanted to do it.
“We are well on our way to that.
“We are trying to improve standards on and off the field. We are shaping up the team to play in a certain style and that is going very well.
“There are things we will analyze, what can we do better, how can we improve, but, ultimately, the goal was to win the Cup and, thankfully, we’ve won it.”
The month of November started with another excellent performance in the 1-1 draw with Borussia Monchengladbach in Germany.
Dembele collected another spot-kick goal, but the Hoops blew the chance of a crucial away victory when Callum McGregor slid one past the post in the fading moments when he only had the keeper to beat.
The following Saturday, Caley Thistle were dismissed 3-0 in Glasgow before a wonderful effort from Stuart Armstrong gave the Hoops a 1-0 win over Kilmarnock in difficult conditions at Rugby Park the following Friday night.
The Champions League adventure ended in Glasgow on Wednesday, November 23, when Lionel Messi netted two goals – one a penalty-kick – as Barcelona triumphed 2-0.
But the Celtic fans were celebrating a few days later with their 100th trophy success over Aberdeen.
Brendan Rodgers was already in the club’s history books. Now the aim was for the domestic treble and the challenge of 9 games in December.
We’ll review these 9 eventual games in December later today. Celtic won 8 and had just the one draw with no defeats. The draw came in the Champions League, away to Manchester City in a game Celtic were unlucky not to win.
The sweetest of the 8 victories was on the last day of 2016 when Celtic played Sevco Rangers for the first time at Ibrox since that club took over from Rangers FC in 2012. Having fallen a goal behind to ex-Rangers and Celtic striker Kenny Miller, the Hoops fought back to win through goals from Dembele and Sinclair.
The gap had never been wider. 19 points clear with a game in hand.
*We have another great offer running for the rest of January on CQN Bookstore.com – order Hoops Stars and Stripes – The Andy Lynch Story by Paul Dykes and you will receive a copy signed by the former Celtic captain Andy Lynch. You will also receive a signed copy of Charlie Gallagher? – What a Player! by David Potter. Charlie is signing a batch of books for us today and we’ll take the chance to do a wee interview with him which should be up this evening.
So get both books – signed by these former Celtic stars – for just £14.99 plus p&p. Order HERE or click on the ad below.
