Auston Trusty

Exactly. BR might well have caused this situation. Trusty came here after a poor season with Sheffield Utd and little praise from their fans. His first few games for us he looked poor, basically what the Utd fans had warned us about, but then he got his act together and looked good. Then, for reasons unknown, BR hooks him at HT in the cup final and drops him for Scales until after the debacle at Snake Mountain. Now it seems Trusty has lost confidence and gone back to square one.

 

He’s done that a couple of times, I don’t know if it’s just the fact he’s man managing players differently based on how he thinks they will react. Maybe he know Trusty needs this, whereas Scales doesn’t.

I’ll add to that and say Rodgers after the 3-0 game said he doesn’t hook players at half time and he wanted to give them a chance at a reaction, but he did hook Trusty previously. Dunno if it’s slip ups or he’s aware of it.

 

Last night he had a disastrous half where he let their in your face style get in his head. He needs to make sure he doesn’t let that happen again and stands up to it.

Just like one top performance in Atalanta doesn’t make him a world beater one bad one at Dundee doesn’t make him terrible either.

In the cup final I do wonder if he was a bit unwell going into it, Bernardo was and then we had a good few miss the next game with illness.

 

I’m not sure he got hooked in the cup final for ‘reasons unknown’. It was pretty clear that we were unable to progress the ball out of defence that first half and his backwards passing and reluctance/inability to carry the ball was a big part of that. Scales, in that regard at least, was much better second half and by extension so were we.

I think it’s still an open question as to whether Trusty will be a success here or not. I’m leaning a bit towards not, and not just based on last night.

The main thing going for Trusty that Scales can’t learn or significantly improve is his natural speed. But in just about every other area he’s probably a similar or even worse level. Like ball carrying and being able to break lines. And Scales isn’t even good in those areas, just serviceable.

It’s early days yet though, so who knows.

 

Hes been generally solid in his time here but was a disaster last night. Tried to overplay when in defence and got caught out l.

 

That seems to be the rumor going around as to why he was subbed but I watched the final and don't recall his play being so bad that he needed replacing after 45mins. It certainly wasn't as bad as Scales first(or second) half at Ibrox which was definitely worthy of the player being replaced. The fact that we seem more interested in how our defenders can pass or carry the ball as opposed to how they actually defend highlights one of the fundamental flaws in our footballing philosophy.

 

Bad day at the office, still think hom and ccv are rock solid! Point will be proved against youngboys

 

Yeah I thought he generally looked to be improving and forming a decent partnership with CCV. Dundee game was a shocker but overall he's done a bit better than I was expecting to be honest.

The big problem we have in our defence is that we are so reliant on CCV being there. Trusty is fine next to him but the whole back 4 seems to dissolve when CCV is out.

 

I'm not for a second going to dispute the importance of our defenders being able to defend (especially not when we've conceded 3 goals in matches several times recently!) but it's also important that our defenders are comfortable and capable in build-up phases, as they're the players who will get the most touches and along with Kasper start most of our phases of play. Also the left CB whether that be Trusty or Scales, is the person opposing teams usually allow to have the ball.

Like it or not, that's how this team has been built, to play out from the back. We're not going to be humping it long to Kyogo, and although using his, Kuhn's and Maeda's pace to get in behind is great, it's often not possible when practically every team in this league camps on the edge of their box 90% of the time.

Although I would contend that Scales made a material difference to our ability to progress the ball out of defence second half in the cup final, I agree that in general he's not particularly an upgrade in that area. The problem is (and I fully accept that it's early days and Trusty has time to improve) we've spent 6 million odd on a player who IMO doesn't look like a clear upgrade on Scales in a number of different areas. He's faster which is great and you can argue a better all round defender, but I don't think it's night and day differences we're talking about, which ideally it would be when you're looking to improve the quality of the squad.

Also, if we're talking about how our defenders actually defend, then Trusty hasn't exactly covered himself in glory in that department a few times recently (neither did Scales at the Hunderdome admittedly). There have been several examples where Trusty has been way too easily brushed off the ball and given up chances as a result. The type of stuff Starfelt used to get slaughtered for.

Sadly for us, CCV's in our price range don't seem to grow on trees.

 

Thought he was pretty solid overall again more like how he had been playing winking lots of headers some good clearances

 

His passing was frustratingly negative in the first half hour and he looked like he lacked a wee but of urgency at times but he gradually came into the game and by the final whistle, I would consider it a very respectable performance overall.

 

Not the worst but there's something about him I just can't take to. Feel like his next * up is always imminent.

 

He can't step forward into midfield and drive the team up the park when for a professional footballer it should be easy..also a couple of times he really should have passed the ball back to the keeper but decided to shield it and turn..it's risky bcoz I don't trust him enough to think he's good enough to get away with it all the time.

 

Good tonight.

 

Brendan Rodgers hailed the response of his centre-half Auston Trusty after the American centre-half helped Celtic progress in the Scottish Cup just days after being criticised for “soft” defending by his manager.

The holders defeated Kilmarnock 2-1 at Celtic Park thanks to goals from Callum McGregor and Daizen Maeda to advance to the last 16 of the tournament and Rodgers was pleased with the reaction of Trusty after the centre-half, signed for £6 million in the summer, was outmuscled for two goals during the midweek 3-3 draw with Dundee.


Trusty kept his place in the team alongside compatriot Cameron Carter-Vickers as Rodgers maintained his 100 per cent record in the Scottish Cup and Celtic geared up for Wednesday’s Champions League clash against Young Boys with a win

He'd realised himself. A lot of the time at Celtic, you may not have so much to do, especially at home. You're there, and I always think that you get your chance to shine away from home, where you've got to stand up and be strong, and that's your bread and butter. Then there'll be times at home, like today, where you've got to stand up and be counted, and I thought he was brilliant at that.

“I spoke to him after the [Dundee] game, I spoke to him the next day. You draw a line under it, he knows exactly where he stands. These are men, these are men. They're not little boys. You can talk openly and honestly to them, and that's what every player will tell you. His response was excellent, he was good in training, so he had to train. You could see his focus, and that's what I expect, because in the big games, the Leipzig, Atalanta, he's been colossal in those games

 

was negative due to no one moving or showing in front of him how many times did he shrug his shoulders and gesture to the lads infront of him to move make space

 

Big man was solid tonight.

 

The whole defence was shaky last night with Trusty being the worst offender.
If you have a go at this Celtic defence they are very fragile, this is obvious as most teams park the bus at CP for damage limitation, go toe to toe with us and get in our face and our defence tends to crumble.

 

You must have watched a different game for large parts of 1st half and parts of 2nd half we were comfortable in the game and dominating the game. Defensively we were relatively good keeper didn’t have a lot to do. It was at points with our passing and no movement in midfield that led to back line being put under pressure.