This was probably the poorest game we have played so far, but as it took us to two points clear at the top, is anyone really going to get upset?
It was disturbing that we could not put them away after such a good first half perfromance, but then again Hearts deserve a little credit for coming back strongly. They did force a few cormers (sometimes conceded by our occasionally careless defence) but there was never any point where I felt that Hearts were bound to score, and we had quite clearly regained the mastery long before Hearts decided to commit suicide twice by picking up red cards. The two red cards (i.e the four yellow cards) were clearly justified.
If something was missing from Celtic today, it was a strong midfield man who could slow things down and hold on to the ball before distributing rather then the 100 miles per hour sort of play which was certainly very entertaining, but which was not always necessarily in the interests of the team.
Mr Clancy? When he was doing his warm up, a voice from the North Stand said something along the lines that he should retire and come and enjoy being “with us, where he belonged”. We all know that Kevin is not one of the hand-shaking, flute playing persuasion, and occasionally I have wondered whether he sometimes is a bit too hard on Celtic? He never really did anything totally outrageous, but there were a few eccentricities yesterday, with some of the offside decisions being a little sharp, possibly a little too sharp? But, he did get the red cards right.
My man of the match was Cameron Carter-Vickers, closely followed by Moritz Jenz – something that possibly makes me seem to agree with Jackie McNamara that Celtic were efficient rather than spectacular. But three points are three points, Celtic are two points in front and there are 34 games to go!
The weather was fine, the atmosphere was great (as one would expect from a full Celtic Park) and we are two points clear at the top.
David Potter
