Criticism hasn’t been something that Odsonne Edoaurd has had during his time at Celtic but it appears that after one or two negative remarks after some recent below-par performances that has filtered through to the Celtic squad with the ‘vice captain’ Callum McGregor coming out to defend the striker.
There are a few of those click-bait sites – and we’ve mentioned this before – who gather together half a dozen negative tweets about a particular Celtic player (most recently Ryan Christie) and make it into a story, that usually sits among the “most read’ on the Celtic page on places like News Now.
Now these guys have no particular love (or hate) of Celtic – they simply know that this will get them a substantial amount of clicks from the Celtic support and presumably they doing this across all the big clubs in the UK. Easy money and all that. It’s annoying for the various Celtic sites who provide plenty of decent content but it’s even more worrying what Callum McGregor reckons that Odsonne Edouard has been getting some stick.
A bigger concern is that French Eddie – who is loved by the Celtic – is still a Celtic player come Monday evening. It’s surely looking promising given the lack of transfer speculation of late and of course Eddie’s own cunning play to play poorly for a game or two will have got the chasing pack off his scent – for now at least!
“That’s always the danger when there’s a couple of days away from the end of the window, you don’t want these things unsettling players. The best business we can do is hold on to our best players, so hopefully that is the case come Monday night,” McGregor told the media, as reported by Daily Record.
“We always know that if he gets a half chance then you are always going to back him to score. He maybe took a little bit of stick last week, but it’s our job to get around him and keep him happy and keep him confident.
“You saw just how important he is to us again on Thursday night. He gets the goal that takes us to the group stage, so again he is showing just how vital he is to the squad,” Calmac said.
“He’s actually been in good spirits. I don’t think he takes too much notice of what goes on around about him. He’s just a good guy and he’s always very happy.
“Our job as teammates and as players is to keep everyone happy, and that’s what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to keep everyone positive and that brings the best out in players to go and give their best on the pitch, which ultimately helps each other.
“We’re a group of guys that are very tight and we’re always getting round each other to make sure we’re all good, happy, and that we keep performing.
“It’s just a case of doing that with Odsonne as well. We get around him and then he delivers for the boys like he did on Thursday night.”
Another player who has been targeted this season for much more criticism is the legendary Celtic captain Scott Brown – who, if you are a reader of Sandman’s Definitive Player Ratings on The Celtic Star (link at end of this article), has been getting Man-of-the-Match more than anyone else this season and two in a row over the last week. Yet the criticism he’s had has been remarkable really.
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“He’s immense. He’s absolutely immense,” McGregor noted. “He’s 35 but he’s probably the fittest in the team. He drives everybody on. He’s absolutely excellent. His influence for us never ever wavers.
“Sometimes, as he’s getting older, people just see one missed tackle maybe or maybe one change of pace that’s not right in the game, and because of his age they try to throw that at him.
“Playing in there beside him, I can tell you that he hasn’t lost a yard. He’s always the fittest guy on the pitch, he’s the fittest in training and he drives the standards.
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“He’s been excellent, but certainly in the last couple of games he’s really shown his mettle again and shown why he’s such a top player.
“We’re obviously very close, we’ve been here for a lot of years together to get that bond. Playing with him in the middle of the pitch, we’re always looking at each other to balance off. If he doesn’t get one, then I’ll get it, and if I miss one then he’ll get it.
“You do develop that bond, and we seem to have a good understanding in the game, which is excellent. He’s just been a leader from day one, and he’s driving that through the whole squad.
“If you don’t watch that and learn from it then you’re missing a trick in my book. Everything he does, I watch it and try to learn from it. He’s been an incredible influence on me.”
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