Hibs 2 – 0 Celtic
CELTIC produced a shockingly poor performance against Hibs at Easter Road this afternoon, losing by 2-0 and Brendan’s Rodgers players can have absolutely no complaints about the scoreline, They got what they deserved from the game, absolutely nothing.
Is it too easy to point to a European hangover from Thursday? Probably, Celtic have been poor, very poor all season in the league away from home.
Too many players were simply not at the races. Neil Lennon won the tactical battle exploiting the back three Brendan Rodgers employed to get on behind Celtic down the wings. Lennon signed Emilio Izaguirre for Celtic and knows that he is prone to be caught out defensively by being caught too far up the park and this was the case incredibly with only 46 seconds gone.
Celtic got off to the worst possible start at Easter Road when they conceded and things weren’t going to get any better from then on in.
Emilio Izaguirre was caught way up the park as Hibs broke and with the left flank exposed Slivka stepped inside and post the rather feeble attempt to win the ball by Simunovic to fire Neil Lennon’s side into an early lead.
Christmas had come early with Celtic dishing up a gift like that.
Hibs had shot themselves in the foot financially by restricting the away support to half the usual allocation. They reckoned that the demand from their own support was such that they would easily sell out those extra seats but as it turned out there was a sparsely populated lower stand and an absolutely empty upper section.
That decision probably cost the Easter Road side around £100,000 and denied thousands of Celtic supporters the chance to attend the game and support the team. Given the performance from the Celtic players it was money saved for the supporters.
David Potter is going to mention our rather unlucky yellow strip so we’ll leave that to him.
Celtic’s first attempt came on six minutes but Olivier Ntcham, who had a shockingly poor game, was wasteful with a free kick in a very promising position. The home side were awarded a free kick of their own five minutes later after Izaguirre fouled Whittaker and Craig Gordon was forced to make the save.
Celtic had most of the possession but were not troubling the Hibs keeper. On 18 minutes a deep Izaguirre cross found Scotty Sinclair who should good control to gather and hit the bye-line but his cross was blocked. Two minutes later Emilio was involved again this time combining with James Forrest who set up Edouard at the edge of the box but his curled effort towards the postage stamp corner was just too high and Hibs survived.
Forrest was causing the Hibs defence problems. He got away from his man with 26 minutes on the clock, on the other side a few minutes later but an latch ditch block was enough to prevent Edouard getting a tap-in. After more Celtic pressure, Hibs lost possession inside their own penalty area but Forrest’s shot was high and wild. Forrest again was the danger man for Celtic an d agin he found space but saw his cross for Edouard blocked, this time by Efe Ambrose.
The French striker was then unlucky to see the flag go up for offside when he was yards onside but that summed up Celtic’s luck today when nothing went right for the Champions who have slipped this weekend off the top spot in the league and are likely to finish the day in third spot.
Scott Brown tried to rally some right with a crunching tackle that saw him earn a yellow card and he could have no complaints about that.
The half ended with Scotty Sinclair doing well down the left but once again the cross didn’t Edouard who seemed to be reluctant to gamble like a goalscoring poacher would.
Celtic come out with intent at the start of the second half and Scotty Sinclair tried to chip the keeper but it came to nothing, Izaguirre then fizzed a low cross across the Hibs goal but there were no yellow jerseys there – again.
Celtic won a free kick in 58 minutes and Ntcham rather stupidly tried to score when it wasn’t on at all but it did lead to a goal – for Hibs! His deflected effort fell to Sinclair who was robbed of possession at the edge of the Hibs box and in a devastating counter-attack Neil Lennon’s side doubled their lead through Kamberi. It was a quality goal and one that Neil Lennon enjoyed on the touchline.
Edouard was tripped at the edge of the area by Whittaker but the referee issued the French striker with a yellow for diving. Rodgers had already replaced Sinclair and Izaguirre, his two wing-backs with Jonny Hayes and Lewis Morgan but neither impressed and have a great deal to do to convince anyone that they are going to make it at Celtic.
Jonny Hayes managed to take the worst corner of the season, and there’s been some pretty stiff competition in that one from his teammates this campaign. It;s just not worked out for the Dubliner at Celtic.
Mikey Johnston replaced Edouard and unbelievably Benkovic did not move to centre-forward with the clock running down. The sight of the talented young winner competing with the Hibs central defence for a high ball tells it’s own story. Johnston was the only bright spark on the entire game for Celtic.
This league is NOT won and with Celtic’s rather abysmal away form it could be LOST.
Time for the cheque book to come out Mr Lawwell.
Man of the Match – Efe Ambrose, chased from Celtic, never puts a foot wrong for Hibs.
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