A wonderful, magical Celtic Star is born at Tynecastle…

In the midst of the qualification process for the Champions League, Brendan Rodgers had faced his first domestic challenges as manager of Celtic.

The quest for six-in-a-row began in Edinburgh, the opening League fixture seeing the Hoops travel to Tynecastle on Sunday, 7 August 2016, four days after Moussa Dembele’s late winner against Astana. The big French striker came in to replace the injured Patrick Roberts, partnering Leigh Griffiths up top as Rodgers went with a 4-4-2 formation. Kolo Toure made his first start, lining up beside Eoghan O’Connell in central defence.

The previous day, Brendan Rodgers had finally got his man, Scott Sinclair signing in a £3.5m transfer from Aston Villa. It had been a whirlwind 24 hours for the 27-year-old Bath-born winger, having undergone a medical before putting pen to paper on a four-year contract. Scott had previously worked under Rodgers at both Chelsea and Swansea, the latter spell seeing him top the scoring charts as the Welsh side secured a place in the English Premier League five years earlier. Sinclair said that he had “played my best football” at the Liberty Stadium, as he looked forward to a new life in Scotland.

“It feels amazing to have joined Celtic. It’s a massive club and I’m happy to be here. I can’t wait to get on the pitch. When I went back to Aston Villa for pre-season, I heard Celtic were interested and I just knew I had to come here. I had to look at this move, and I thought it would be great for me. And because I know the manager and I know what to expect, hopefully, I can get off to a flying start.”

A happy Celtic manager returned the implied compliment. “I had [Scott] in at Chelsea when he was 16 years of age. I know him probably as well as anyone and I know his qualities.”

Scott Sinclair would start on the bench at Tynecastle but there was a notable debut in the Hearts line-up. That was former Celt Tony Watt, deservedly dining out forever on THAT GOAL against Barcelona almost four years earlier, the big striker hoping that he would find that elusive consistency with Robbie Neilson’s side.

I did too. Just not today, Tony.

Celts were on the front foot from the kick-off, in front of 17,000 in the noisy cauldron of Tynecastle. And they struck first after only eight minutes, Callum McGregor’s run blocked by a defender, perhaps illegally, but the ball falling kindly for James Forrest, who curled a delightful left-foot shot past Jack Hamilton in the home goal for 1-0. Replays would later suggest that the lurking Stuart Armstrong was interfering with the goalkeeper’s line of sight from an offside position. I would certainly be claiming it. It was a real let-off for Celtic.

Midway through the first half, there were two incredible missed chances at either end within a minute. First, Tony Watt rose to meet a cross from the right, which had taken out Craig Gordon, only to head wide of the open goal. Then a long ball beat the leap of John Souttar to send Leigh Griffiths through with only Hamilton to beat, his cute left-foot lob doing just that but drifting inches wide of the post.

Ten minutes before the interval came the major talking point of the match, Jamie Walker spun then fell to the ground at the edge of the box, Kieran Tierney in close proximity but having made no contact. To the horror of the Celtic players and support behind that goal, referee John Beaton pointed to the spot. A calamitous decision.

Nevertheless, the Hearts winger picked himself up and calmly slotted the ball home, with Gordon choosing the wrong corner. The postscript to this incident is that Walker was given a two-match ban for simulation, however, as in all of these cases, the goal stood, and the suspension would be of no benefit whatsoever to Celtic.

The final chance of the half fell the way of the visitors, Moussa Dembele’s shot blocked but Griffiths first to react. His shot beat the keeper before being acrobatically cleared on the line by Igor Rossi, whose timely intervention saw the teams going in level at 1-1 at the break.

With an hour on the clock, Brendan Rodgers made a game-changing substitution, Scott Sinclair replacing Stuart Armstrong. A second change then followed within 10 minutes, Tom Rogic coming on for Eoghan O’Connell as the Celtic manager moved to a back three.

As we moved past the 80-minute mark, Hearts were enjoying decent possession and had forced a corner, but 60 seconds later, it was 2-1 Celts. A lightning break from defence owed much to the pace and control of Leigh Griffiths, the Scotland forward leaving two home defenders for dead down the left flank before pitching a wonderful low cross into the box. Scott Sinclair had burst a gut to match the striker’s run through the centre, timing his own entry into the box to perfection to meet the ball first-time with his left-foot to slide it past Hamilton for the match-winning goal.