David Turnbull has revealed that the Celtic gaffer, Ange Postecoglou, and the rest of the Bhoys try to ignore the league table and approach each game with the intent of getting three points.
After Celtic’s 2-1 victory over Ross County, they have now achieved 14 wins from their first 15 fixtures in the Scottish Premiership. Turnbull explains that the winning attitude that has been drilled into the Celtic squad, was by Ange Postecoglou, who has led the bhoys nine points clear at the top of the table.
After going one down due to an unfortunate penalty, Turnbull stepped up and netted the equaliser for the bhoys, and launched the comeback which led Celtic to victory in Paradise. Especially since theRangers failed to take three points from St Mirren, Celtic had the opportunity to extend their lead at the top of the table, which they did due to the brilliance of both Turnbull and Haksabanovic.
As reported by the Glasgow Times, Turnbull said: “I don’t think the gaffer or any of the boys focus on the league table, we focus on ourselves and try to get three points in every game. We take each game as it comes, so we don’t really look at the table.”
“There is plenty of motivation for the boys every week. The league title is a motivation, every game we play we are always ready to go and play our game style. So far it is going well. I didn’t know the Rangers result before the game. By the time we got here and got ready, we focused on our own game. I saw it after the game though.”
“We don’t focus on anyone else, or their results, it is about what we do. We are doing brilliantly right now and now we have to keep it going.”
Turnbull continues to concede that Celtic wasn’t displaying their best football against County, but explained that you have to dig deep sometimes to grind out a victory.
“Are those the types of games that win you titles? You need to dig in sometimes. I thought we were in control until the Ross County penalty incident. After that, we worked hard and we did that. We created plenty of chances and it was a great result. We showed our character again by coming back from the penalty.
“I haven’t seen it back but I thought it was a bit crazy at the time. After that, we showed how good we are and we put our own stamp on the game and we did well.”
Responding to whether every handball incident results in a penalty, Turnbull said…
“I think it might be. I think they will give a penalty whenever it hits a hand and then no one will complain. People still will, but it is hard as players as you need to watch where you put your hands and it is tough, but they are the rules.”
“We were playing well without really creating much before the penalty. After that it spurred us on a bit more to get the two goals that we got.”
Celtic currently have a comfortable lead at the top of the table, as the World Cup break approaches. The Bhoys who aren’t heading to Qatar will be set to join Ange down under for a camp as the World Cup begins. Turnbull doesn’t think that the Bhoys will fall off form due to the oddly timed hiatus.
“Will we get better after the World Cup break? I think so. Hopefully we will have most of the boys back from injury after it.”
“The break will do us good and then we want to come back firing on all cylinders. We have 14 wins out of 15 in the league which is great. We had one blip at St Mirren which was tough. We knew after that we could have played better but in the other 14 games we have been brilliant.”
“We know every game is different and you will face challenges. We don’t go into any game thinking it will be easy. The St Mirren game wasn’t great but we knew if we played the way we can then we wouldn’t have many other results like that.”
“Now we have to kick on and try to keep winning. The gaffer won’t let us take our foot off the gas. We are going to play every game as if it is our last and try to get as many wins as we can.”
READ THIS…Celtic in Australia, 1977 – Winners of the World of Soccer Cup
