Celtic vs Malmö - Wednesday, 19th August Live BT Sport Europe

i agree i think commons should play, but not out wide.

 

gordon
lustig van dijk boyata izzy
brown biton johanson gms
commons
ciftci​

anybody think that would work ? brown has played that role before.

 

He's not a goal threat out wide though, and Rogic done a great job CAM in scoring a goal and creating chances plus has better touch, balance and pace. Not to mention Commons has never excelled in Europe, got a good few goals here and there but I think is better utilised coming on later in a match.

 

Johansen out wide and that would work I think, Johansen was moved out wide against Stanjarn I think at home and put in some good crosses.

 

Was he not our second top goalscorer from out wide last season? At the qualifier level Commons has more goals in Europe than anyone else in our team.

Whats the point about Rogic? Do you want him out wide or instead of Johansen?

 

True even when having a poor game he scores, but I think against Malmo he isn't going to have time or space if he starts but if he comes on later in the game when they are tired that's when he will be most lethal.

Just making the point that Rogic could have just as much of shout to play as Commons with what he could add to the team. It seems anyway for Europe the 3 behind the striker will be set as GMS, Johansen and Armstrong as long as everyone is fit. Forrest and Commons could as well be in the team but Ronny definitely picks the players who will work and run all game for Europe.

 

The one thing Commons always has is space. He makes space for himself far more than any other player in our team. Commons brings a goal threat and creativity. He also protects his full back better than Armstrong, who works hard but his positioning is awful out wide.

I think you can only make the point about Rogic if you ignore there full Celtic careers and judge what both of them can do over the 60 minutes that Rogic was on the field and there's also the fact that Rogic is either on for Bitton, Brown or Johansen, depending where you're playing him.

 

Was down at the TO this morning activating ST cards for a few mates and going by the queues yesterday and today, which were long- very long, and dare say tomorrow after 12pm when ST's can buy extra's I think any general sale is going to be quite limited.

 

I think 4 extra tickets for ST holders is a bit extreme, i think it will leave availability for a general sale to be in the low thousands.

 

Aye quite * off at the 4 extra tickets thing. They need to come up with a points system so the people who can't afford season tickets but regularly go to games aren't shafted

 

Having skimmed through these pages I've come to the conclusion that Celtic fans are a friendly bunch that don't rate Malmö very high, the opposite is probably true as well. I guess you couldn't really expect any of us to keep up with each other's leagues.

I do have to say though that I'm shocked so many Celtic fans rated Partizan Belgrade and Maccabi Tel Aviv ahead of us.

Personally I believe we are good enough to beat anyone including Basel in the Champions Route in a head-to-head match, but possibly also bad enough to lose agains any of the teams.

A few points though. We are much better than Elfsborg or Helsingborg where when they played Celtic. Or 6th place in the league, now only 4 points behind the leader may lead you to think we have been weakened. I would say no to that. The Swedish league is played from spring to fall, thus most of our players are usually sold half ways into the season. It is not unusual to see Swedish players that know they will leave by the summer having their heads somewhere else than on than on the pitch. This is exactly what happened this years, our defenders Erik Johansson and Filip Helander who both left about two months ago where horrible in the 13-14 games they played. Since the summer 6 new players have joined Malmö FF, I would say most of them have strengthened the team compared to what we had last year.

Also I see Jo Inge Berget is often brought up here as one of our star players. That's simply not true. He has at times during the season been put on the bench, however last two games he has been great. That said, there will be times when Tobias Sana or Eikrem is chosen ahead of Berget depending on form and tactics.

Anyway, if you guys want to know why I'm optimistic about Malmö proceeding from this encounter, here it comes.. I believe Malmö are more used to playing games that matters, there are at least 4-5 teams in our league who when we play it's a game between two teams within range of winning the championship. This week we played IFK Gothenburg on top of the table in a very intense game. In the coming weeks we will play AIK, Djurgården and Elfsborg in similar games. My view is that Celtic only gets these kinds of games once the European campaign starts. I could of course be wrong on that.

But whatever, anything can happen...

 

Malmo set to take record travelling support to Celtic Park


http://videocelts.com/2015/08/blogs...velling-support-to-celtic#lqh223sLOfD71QTh.99

 

Isn't Markus Rosenberg like Malmo's star striker?

Guy must be about 33 now, couldn't score in a brothel for West Brom a couple seasons back.

 

But his touch is usually pish and won't have time on the ball, he definitely doesn't cover the full back as good as Armstrong, that's why Armstrong get's games his work rate back and covering LB and in the middle when there are spaces, if Commons tries to do that he's usually blown out his *.

I was just making a point with Rogic, his style and ability is very suited to Europe but of course he needs more game time etc.

Commons struggled against Thistle out wide, he's good coming inside sometimes but that takes our width which will be vital against Malmo, they will be happy to overload the middle of the park.

 

Not sure it's worth the effort trying to convince you Rosenberg is a great player at the CL-qualifying level, he has scored plenty since he was in WBA. I'm genuinely curious though who Celtic has that can match his experience.

 

Hold on - you may be playing more games that matter as your league is more competitive, but what about the quality of the teams you are playing? How many are left in Europe? How many played in the group stages last season? We know our teams are not very good and this is reflected in their European performances. Perhaps the difference is we can deal with our rotten teams better than you can with yours!

 

The European campaign is the beginning of our season

Anyway, Celtic has plenty of experience with games that matter, long traditions for playing in Europe and two domestic cups ensure that even with the huns in the lower division. We've also had a lot more continuity over the last year than Malmo

 

I think 4-5 teams are ranked higher than the 2nd SPL-team. Not that rankings means that much. There has been 3 different teams in the Europa League groups the past few years though.

 

We don't have anyone of his experience up front. It's currently the weakest position in our team unfortunately. The good news for us is that we have goals throughout our team.

I don't really fear Rosenberg especially, but no doubt he has been there and done it at this level, so it would be silly of us to write him off entirely. Our defence is very strong right now however. I'm expecting two close, low-scoring games.

 

I disagree with just about all of that, so we'll leave it there.