SENTINELCELTS

Celtic only went and pulled off a ‘Whitney Houston’ yesterday aka saving the best for last. The final fixture of 2024 was gratefully at home, and to round off a momentous year the Hoops turned on the style and for the second time in a row hit domestic opposition for four goals without reply.

The game itself was keenly anticipated and that was compounded by the teamsheet which fulfilled my Saturday wish of an Engels, Bernardo, Hatate trio in midfield. More changes came in the form of Valle and Kyogo being brought back into the starting 11, along with AJ resuming his usual berth. The result of the tinkering was everything we could have asked for. Celtic had a new leash of life about them, a fresh energy on the park, and despite just one goal as we approached the hour mark it was an obvious mismatch as the home side played with a true swagger. We not only completely dominated possession but found a fluidity that’s been missing for a spell. Our movement was fantastic, our pass and go tactic constantly opening up numerous options, our timing was onpoint all afternoon, hence the article title. The record books will show that Celtic scored 4 goals in total, the reality showed 3 different players finishing off four fine assists rather than scoring a self-made goal.

Reo had found his mojo, and started the romp with a defense splitting pass through the middle for our current best player to finish in his typical German style. It’s a pity Reo isn’t officilly credited with assisting the 2nd, but we all know it was his cheeky and audacious one-time chip into the box that brought about the goal. If Paolo had scored it would have been a goal-of-the-season contender, but Kyogo was poaching so no harm done by the initial save.
Arne turned provider for the 3rd with a whipping cross right into the dangerzone that was just begging to be finished, as was Bernardos inch perfect pass that curled a little bit directly onto Daizens right foot for the forth. Each assist has its own merits, but the unofficial Reo lob for the second was my favourite. All four were also pleasing from a tactical perspective, I would much rather have a team creating chances to score than relying on individual players to produce some magic.
Also on the tactics front our first three subs made an immediate impact on the game and quickly helped carve out a goal, they were clearly primed, focused, and ready for actions,,kudos all involved.

There were no failures on the day. I became a bigger fan of Valle, felt Arne played with determination and had one of his better games in the Hoops, I even thought Yang looked better than recently. POTY selection is a very hard decision, long may that continue.

Speaking of decisions, when your manager shuffles the pack and the team produces somewhat of a breakout performance, it’s natural to say ‘don’t change it!’. I’m not naive enough to believe that’s Callum benched now, but Im confident enough to believe Brendan will have learnt today’s lesson, the three foreign midfielders together are a formidable force and a great fallback formation.

The occasion, the week, heck even the season, was spiced up by events elsewhere, and we enter the new year a whopping 14 points ahead with the following day offering the opportunity to extend that gap by a further 3.
Just as we made yesterday’s clash look easy, we are making the SPL look easy, and I hope and pray we aim to continually make European qualification look exactly the same.

By Mahe
sentinelcelts@gmail.com