I watched this game from my Holiday Retreat through the somewhat imperfect medium of Celtic TV and BBC Radio Scotland. It was confusing because Radio Scotland was about one minute ahead, and Celtic TV kept stalling and disappearing (well, it does, doesn’t it?) but I was able to pick out the salient facts and features.
One was that this was a very poor crowd. Was everyone, like me, on holiday? Or is there something more sinister? Or is it the more mundane reason that it is a lot easier to get to a football match on a Saturday than a Sunday? For whatever reason, the occasion seemed to lack atmosphere. Was I correct?
The other thing was that it was not the best of games, but at least it was three points gained (two more than a certain other team). It was the right result, and it might go some way to dispel talk of “crisis”!
But it has complicated the Boyata situation. He played well, took his goal well (it was a very simple one, however) and showed that we really need him. Once again I plead for clarity, however. Let us have a statement, please, from somebody. Is he going to be with us all season? We really need to know that.
How on earth could anyone make Dembele the man of the match? He didn’t have a bad game, but he missed quite a few chances, particularly headers over the bar. Kieran Tierney was surely a better bet for the honour.
No-one could blame the defence today. They handled whatever was thrown at them (very little, as it turned out), and although I think that Scott Brown and Callum McGregor have shaded a little of late, the midfield was still well on top. It was just that we lacked a cutting edge up front, and the sooner that Leigh Griffiths gets the monkey of “100 goals” off his back the better.
Still, a win is a win. It would be nice to win the next two games 1-0, would it not?
David Potter
David Potter’s new book – Celtic – How the League was Won 49 Times is out now. Click on the cover image below to order an advance copy together with a FREE copy of That Season in Paradise – Ten Months of Celtic Heaven which is signed by none other that Lisbon Lion, Bertie Auld.
