For Celtic, ahead of Sunday’s Glasgow Derby at Celtic Park, there are some lessons to learn from theRangers European capitulation at the hands of Slavia Prague on Thursday night.
Celtic face an opponent we have evidently struggled with of late and one who at times appears to have had our card marked. Indeed, in the nine head to heads between the teams since Steven Gerrard was given the top job at Ibrox, theRangers have certainly had the advantage, winning five of those games, including each of the past three encounters as the momentum has swung their way. There are however clear signs that theRangers may well be starting to creek now.
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It could well have been the excessive celebrations of course that impacted the first leg performance, one where they were lucky to leave Prague with a draw, but there were no such excuses for the way their side came apart at the seams on Thursday at Ibrox.
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There have been signs this was in the post, as in the league they were quite often scoring high numbers against teams in the first half of the Premiership campaign, whilst in the second part of the season, they’ve been more efficient rather than spectacular as they arrowed in on their first league title. Indeed, in four of their last seven games theRangers have returned narrow 1-0 victories – then came Thursday night where it really started to unravel, where vulnerabilities were really shown to be evident.
Slavia Prague it must be said are a good side and it’s fair to say better than most sides our opponents have faced this season, but it was their tactical approach as to how to stifle the Ibrox side that stood out.
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Slavia weren’t particularly fearful of any player in an attacking sense, indeed the only players they paid any particular direct attention to were Ryan Kent and Alfredo Morelos when they were on the ball.
Instead, Slavia’s highly impressive coach Jindřich Tripišovský – have a word Celtic, you never know – placed more of their efforts on stopping theRangers progress through the thirds. Clearly targeting the central defenders as a weak link in possession and comfortable for them to have the ball, Slavia were directed to close down theRangers full backs correctly assuming the press would force the ball inside to those vulnerable central defenders, like the ball was a hot tattie, when pressed even gently by the striker, theRangers were forced to play the ball into defensive midfield positions where an ambush of a press was laid and attacking runners got on their toes as Slavia won the ball in high areas close to Alan McGregor’s goal.
This was not Guardiola type overly complicated approach to humbling an opponent to open up space for their attacking players, it was a basic foil to trap theRangers in their own half, and as we saw, stop theRangers from getting up a head of steam. It worked.
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Instead theRangers resorted to longer balls to Morelos, that were meat and drink to their defenders, as Morelos, good as he is at turning opponents, is poor in the air, or they resorted long diagonals bypassing the pressured midfield to the likes of Ryan Kent, who was soon forced onto his weaker foot and double up on. However even the distance between Kent’s other attacking partners was managed closely by Sparta and in turn theRangers wide player was forced backwards.
From there Slavia were satisfied for the ball to be forced back to the defenders and the trap was laid again. Sparta of course won 2-0 but could and should have easily had a penalty and late in the game chose not to turn the screw, comfortable as they were that they had their opponent well beaten.
What was very clear however was that the much lauded theRangers’ coaching team had no response. Subsequently on the field, in the second half in particular, discipline dissipated as we saw from Kemar Roofe’s assault that could have resulted in jail time never mind a red card.
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There was a further red card for Balogun and just prior to the alleged racist comment to Glen Kamara, Conor Goldson escaped punishment for a stamp on a Slavia player lying prostrate on the ground. They had lost the plot entirely on the field as those on the bench could not counter the tactical acumen evidenced from the Slavia bench.
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Celtic then you’d hope would have been watching closely. At Ibrox in January, prior to Nir Bitton’s harsh sending off, Celtic were causing similar problems. Our own full backs kept them occupied and we pushed theRangers onto the back foot until we went down to ten men and from there Neil Lennon’s in-game management and substitutions were somewhat questionable to say the least.
If however, lessons have been learned we can adopt similar tactic to Slavia from Thursday come Sunday lunchtime. Perhaps having Odsonne Edouard partnered with the ever-willing runner of Patryck Klimala could press from the front if we continue with a 4-4-2 Diamond. However, a 4-3-3 or 4-3-2-1 formation may be the way to go.
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With Edouard occupying the central defenders then perhaps there is scope, if fit, to employ Ryan Christie on the left and the returning James Forrest on the right supported by a midfield three of Callum McGregor, Scott Brown (or the energy of Ismaila Soro) and David Turnbull to press onto theRangers backline and force the sort of mistakes they evidenced on Thursday night that they can make when pressured.
Of course, we are unlikely to have a game refereed to the sort of high standard as Israeli Orel Grinfeld supplied on Thursday as Willie Collum takes centre stage on Sunday, however we can impose ourselves on theRangers and John Kennedy certainly has a blueprint to follow thanks to Jindřich Tripišovský’s impressive Slavia Prague side.
Niall J
COMING SOON…
