Saturday will be a tough task for Brendan Rodgers and his Celtic side, but the tremendous surface at Fir Park will suit us…
Celtic v St. Johnstone – cinch Premiership – Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers during the cinch Premiership match on Saturday August 26, 2023. Photo Steve Welsh
Saturday afternoon provides another hurdle in our league campaign as we travel to a face a decent Motherwell side who are playing some good football under Stuart Kettlewell. Yes, yet another tough away trip to negotiate only seven games into the campaign having already travelled to Pittodrie, Ibrox and the Tony Macaroni and we”ve also got upcoming trips to both Hibs and Hearts. As tough starts to a league campaign goes this season is pretty exceptional.
Brendan Rodgers is seen at full time during the Cinch Scottish Premiership match between theRangers and Celtic at Ibrox on September 03, 2023. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)
But we overcame those three challenges to come out with maximum nine points from nine and we should be looking to make that a dozen on Saturday. It’s been a tough schedule but our class has shone through and we have proved as the chat says, ‘that’s why we’re Champions’.
Fir Park is always a difficult venue and Saturday will be no different, especially with the home side in such good form. Yes, they lost at Ibrox last week, but only narrowly and were unlucky not to come away with at least a point. They were of course hindered by the match officials who have conspired to ensure two home wins against Motherwell on Sunday and Livingston last night through what increasingly looks like corruption.
Willie Collum was as the centre of it last night – incredibly ignoring a blatant push then Nick Walsh failing to intervene on VAR (the system we were told would ensure that these kind of instances would be a thing of the past) – and he has the whistle at Fir Park at the weekend.
Celtic of course have the quality to go there and continue our winning ways. The surface at Fir Park will also help as it’s one of the best surfaces in the country, a million miles better than David Martindale’s magic carpet we had to play on last weekend.
This will help us as it suits our style of play which is of course to keep the ball on the deck. It has the makings for a good game and hopefully we come out on top, which I’m sure we will, although we’ll have to worry about Collum and his chums on VAR to see what mischief that they can through our way.