Always the Hard Way

By: Matt | May 11th, 2009

Never ones to do things the easy way, Celtic will now have the come from behind and rely on other teams to win the SPL Title for the fourth year in a row, as Saturday they were defeated by Rangers 1-0 at Ibrox. Rangers struck in the first have with a Steven Davis goal that Celtic could never match. Eyebrows were raised early when Gordon Strachan put Shaun Maloney in the starting line up for the first time in six months instead of usual starter Aiden McGeady. Celtic had a few chances, including a Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink header that was cleared off of the line. After Rangers took a first half lead, Celtic enjoyed a majority of the possession in the second half, but could not benefit from all the possession. The defeat leaves Celtic two points behind Rangers with three matches to go. There is little time for mourning for Celtic, as Celtic return home Tuesday to take on Dundee United. Scott Brown will be available for Celtic after serving his two match ban for yellow cards, albeit yellow cards from LAST SEASON. Stephen McManus is likely to still be missing because of knee injury. Check out my thoughts on the Rangers loss and the Dundee United match after the jump.

-The obvious talking point is including Shaun Maloney instead of Aiden McGeady in the starting line up. It was Maloney’s first start in a long time because of injury and it showed. Maloney lacked pace and touch all match, meanwhile Aiden McGeady was coming off perhaps his best game against Rangers in the last meeting in the League Cup Final. Maloney also seemed out of place on the Rangers goal, perhaps costing Celtic the game. Could this line up move have cost Celtic the league and Gordon Strachan his job eventually?
-Marc Crosas was quoted a few weeks back saying that the atmosphere in a Celtic-Rangers game was nothing compared to a Barcelona-Real Madrid match, so Crosas does not have the excuse that the atmosphere is what caused him to go missing in Saturday’s match. I was expecting big thinks from the Barca Bhoy, but he was a non-factor. Hindsight is twenty/twenty, but I might go with Barry Robson in place of Crosas for the rest of the season if Robson is healthy.
-The Darren O’Dea as a leftback experiment can officially be put to rest now. O’Dea’s touch was poor, he lacked the pace to keep up with the Rangers he was marking, and generally seemed out of place. O’Dea has a future as a centerback for Celtic, but his performance on Saturday should show that a leftback is desperately needed for Celtic this summer.

Keep the Faith