Celtic 1-Dundee United 1-S.O.S

By: Matt | August 18th, 2008

Am I sending out a distress signal for Celtic after yesterday’s disappointing draw at Tannadice? Definitely not, it was only the second game of the season and as we saw last year, any disparity in the table can be made up by some timely victories against the team from across town. The “SOS” rather stands for “Sort (it) Out Strachan”. After a rather dull forty five minutes of football, Celtic came out of the second half attacking and creating chances. These chances resulted in Paul Hartley’s fine strike after a good run up of play and a fine pass by recently healthy Shunsuke Nakamura saw Celtic temporarily take the lead. However, history did not repeat itself this time as Dundee United super sub Francisco Sandaza equalized the game. United were furious a few moments earlier when Gary Caldwell slid into Roy O’Donovan in the box but the referee was not sympathetic. Dundee fans perhaps got a bit of poetic justice a few moments later when ref Charlie Richmond collided with Shunsuke Nakamura and was not able to continue through the rest of the match. Never the less, United were able to equalize with Francisco Sandaza capping a frantic half that ended the match with both teams only picking up a point. The match result meant that the Hamilton Accies currently sit atop the Scottish Premier League.

Once again, Celtic exhibited early season “rust”. There is not really any players that played exceptionally well, with perhaps the exception being Shunsuke Nakamura. Naka put in some beautiful crosses and did not seem to miss a step despite coming back from injury. Nakamura was subbed out in the 68th minute for the sick Barry Robson. Once again, despite looking lost and playing the wing of his weak foot, Gordon Strachan continues to put him there. The honeymoon is apparently over with Gary Caldwell, as both he and Captain Stephen McManus looked shaky at best at times, culminating in the Francisco Sandaza goal. Scott McDonald missed a chance to go ahead late in the game with a header that was four yards out wide. It was a very forgettable performance to say the least. The frustrating part is both the lack of different tactics that Gordon Strachan uses and the various players that continue to be played out of their natural position.

It was clear that is just was not Scott McDonald’s day. Everyone has off days and you cannot be too hard on a 30 goal scorer from the previous season. However, we spent 3 million on Georgios Samaras, yet he only gets a four minute run out, where he is not likely to change the game. Hopefully Strachan takes something from this game, because after two poor performances that quite frankly Celtic is lucky to take 4 points from, some changes would hopefully be seen.

TAL

(P.S. If anyone can fin a video of the ref getting hurt and post it here, you’d be in line for a karmic high five. C’mon, who doesn’t love seeing a ref, any ref, fall?