Celtic fan protest. Partick Thistle v Celtic. Premier Sports League Cup. Sunday 21 September. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)
Q: The focus of the team, the desire from the first minute was impressive?
Brendan Rodgers:“Yes, I think we needed to be all over Partick today. I think if you give any team you come away from home a quarter-final of a cup, if you look for an easy game, they will give you a really difficult game. So that was the message before coming out. We need to be all over these guys from the beginning, and thankfully, our pressing intensity was really good.”
Brendan Rodgers at Firhill. Partick Thistle v Celtic. Premier Sports League Cup. Sunday 21 September. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)
Q: And now you’ve got a big draw vs (the)Rangers in the semi-final?
Brendan Rodgers: “Yes, I think that whatever team you play in the semi-final, going to Hampden, I think that was important for us to get back there. A lot of games in between then and, hopefully, between now and then, we can build the rhythm and keep growing and arrive in a good place for the semi-final.”
Q: Do you expect that the atmosphere around the team and the dynamic of the team will be very different from what we saw at Ibrox a couple of weeks ago?
Brendan Rodgers: “Ibrox was I think I said it at the time, for both teams, it wasn’t a great game, to be honest. Obviously, my worry was only Celtic, so we weren’t in our best place. Even though in other times you go to Ibrox and you get a point, it might be deemed okay. But for me, as I said, it was just about trusting the team and trusting how we work and, more importantly, trusting the players, which I do. And I can see the fluency starting to arrive.”
Colby Donovan, Callum McGregor and Brendan Rodgers all smiles after the match. Partick Thistle v Celtic. Premier Sports League Cup. Sunday 21 September. Photo Vagelis Georgariou (The Celtic Star)
Q: It was an ideal preparation for midweek, Brendan, yes?
Brendan Rodgers: “Yes, I think any good win, good performance, clean sheet, going into Europe was always good. So, yes, lots of players are getting good game time. People may be looking and thinking, ‘Well, why do you not make more changes?’ But, actually, a lot of the players haven’t been playing so much. If you think of the international break, a lot of the players, sometimes, that went on international duty, didn’t get a lot of game time. So, if they didn’t play today, it could have been a long time before they played. So, the guys coming off the bench, impacting the game as well, we look forward to that game there on Wednesday.”
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Decent performance yesterday, on another poor pitch, so exciting prospect of what this team of ours, to see what can actually be produced in the next 2 games on better playing surfaces.
The structure of the squad is completed now by the looks of things. Hopefully the one dimensional look, doesn’t become an issue, where it’s so obvious what our gameplan will be for every game, with starting 11, and subs used in games.
The fiasco over the summer, I still don’t believe is totally finalised either, especially as only 3 changes are allowed in January to our European squad, which I still believe that potentially has more than 3 at present, who could be looking at there futures elsewhere from ourselves.
Got time now, over the challenges ahead over the next few months now, so have to see what develops regarding that situation. At least when jota returns, it could provide a better balance in our attacking options, especially as we could look unbalanced with our right side in operation?
Big few months for yang, who even if quite enough yesterday, still had big moments within the game. Our style of play involves big moments within it, plenty produced yesterday, and delighted to see so many contributing to those big moments, as that should improve confidence going forward for ourselves imo.
Would like to think that yesterday, was eventually the kick start of our season, been a while in waiting, but eventually achieved by the looks of things.
Whether that’s good or enough, remains an answer in waiting, but confidence growing after yesterday, for myself anyway.