Celtic claimed a crucial 3 points in Perth today against the backdrop of yet more absentees from the first team squad due to a mixture of suspected Covid-19 cases and an ever increasing injury list. That list continued to grow when returning Japanese star Kyogo went down once again in what looks like a reoccurrence of the injury that ruled him out for a period just a matter of weeks ago. I doubt any manager has ever looked forward to a winter break as much as Ange Postecoglou.
With St Johnstone fighting for their lives at the bottom of the Cinch Premiership, what was looking like a tricky enough trip to McDiarmid Park became even more of a potential banana skin when even more first team players dropped out of the squad in the lead up to kick off. Among those missing included our in form captain Callum McGregor, Anthony Ralston and Mikey Johnston, handing fringe stars yet another opportunity to impress.
One of the most worrying sights was seeing Vasilis Barkas back on the team sheet. You could argue Barkas is currently out fourth choice keeper but with Hart, Bain and Hazard all missing the Greek international was back between the sticks to the horror of most Celtic fans who still wake up in sweats at night thinking about some of the performances he’s put in whilst at Celtic Park.
Celtic though started the match well dominating possession, and to great relief managed something we have failed to achieve in a while, score an early goal. Liel Abada, who in my opinion has struggled recently, showed great determination to follow up on his initial shot to head in the opener.
After Kyogo was taken off after pulling up with injury to increase the Celtic faithfuls anxiety, Abada stepped up in the absence of his fellow summer signing to ease our fears with a second goal our little Number 8 would have been proud of. Once again the Wizard of Oz Tom Rogic was involved, playing a lovely ball through the defence that Abada expertly dispatched.
With St Johnstone showing no threat throughout the first half it looked like we would finally have an easy, stress free day ahead but somehow Celtic contrived to make it nervy once again when Carl Starfelt had one of his many moments of madness which led to Chris Kane scoring a wonderful header and it was game on once more.
Thankfully just as I started to wonder if it’s possible that we could end up dropping points to yet another Saints team, our captain for the day Nir Bitton eased my worries by scoring a lovely goal after being set up by….you guessed it, Tom Rogic.
A vital 3 points won by Celtic and barring the slip up against St Mirren a few days ago I feel like we have managed to get through this horrendous month of December relatively unscathed. With the almost unbelievable amount of injuries and other problems such as the rigorous fixture schedule and covid incidents I feel that we have done as well as could be expected. Hopefully after the winter break we are in a much stronger position player wise to lead a charge on the title over the remaining half of the season.
Quick shout out to a few players that I feel really stepped up today to get us over the line. Tom Rogic has been probably the most important player in our squad this season. Yes Kyogo and Jota may get more headlines but almost everything good that happens on the pitch goes through the Australian. We really are lucky to have him and it’s scary to think we almost lost him to a Saudi Arabian team recently. Thank god he decided to stay. Under Ange I feel he will only get better.
Nir Bitton took the captain’s armband today and I think he gave a proper leaders performance. Not only was he steady in his defensive work in the middle as he always is but he was also excellent playing further forward, linking play up well and of course scoring the vitally important third goal. Anyone who still doesn’t rate his contribution to Celtic needs to have a word with themselves.
Also Liel Abada, who I previously mentioned I felt had been struggling lately, really showed his worth today and his two goals were perfectly timed and huge in the context of how the game panned out. I was willing him on the rest of the game to claim his hat trick as his performance deserved it. Hopefully after a good rest during the winter break he can kick on in the new year. It’s easy to forget this young lad is pretty much the same age as Owen Moffat which shows that the high expectations we place on him may be a bit over the top sometimes. He has huge potential and let’s hope he continues to get better and better.
Conall McGinty
TWICE AS GOOD
Thanks to everyone who ordered Harry Hood – Twice as Good for Christmas presents. If you got an Ange jumper instead then why not order this brilliant book by Matt Corr, or indeed David Potter’s biography of another Celtic legend Alec McNair – born on this day incidentally – from Celtic Star Books or from the official Celtic stores?
