Certain Celtic fans have been vying for Neil Lennon to be ousted from the hotspot in the dugout for quite some time now, and got what they wished for tonight; albeit not in the circumstances they would’ve hoped for.
Following the majority of the first team squad’s isolation, Neil Lennon was unable to take the reigns in Monday’s stalemate at home to Hibernian on Monday night, meaning that Gavin Strachan followed in his father’s footsteps as he led a depleted squad out at home to the Hibees.
Fielding a slightly younger and inexperienced side due to the plethora of options not being available towards him, Strachan was delighted with how his mismatched side played and claimed Celtic were very unlucky not to take all three points under the floodlights.
Speaking to Sky Sports about his youthful sides’ involvements, Strachan said: “Yeah, they really did play well. They had quite a lot about them; we know they’re good players but they were coming up against a good, physical Hibs team and for the most part they managed it really well, so it is a tough one to take. I think anyone in Hibs’ situation would try and tap into the situation that has occurred over the last day or so, and we said we were pleased with the performance levels of everybody and we thought we had done enough to win the game.”
“It was fine, I knew what I had to do and when you’re working with a lot of good people it makes it a lot easier. Neil was saying little bits like keep the energy up and I thought we did that quite well. We’re just going to crack on with our preparation for the next game against Livingston and we will continue to do so until word changes. I’m not entirely sure when the senior players are back given what has happened so I can’t let you know in that respect.”
David Turnbull impressed, and the Celtic first-team coach was delighted with how he played. “He’s progressing very well, he had a couple of setbacks with COVID and injuries but he’s got up to the pace of how we work at the club. We always knew about his ability, it was just getting up to speed – but he’s a superbly talented player and he’s shown that tonight.”
Strachan takes charge against Livingston on Saturday, and he’ll be hoping to go one better against ‘Livi’ as they visit Celtic Park on Saturday afternoon.
