Ange Postecoglou

Good. Knew he’d be like that. The guy has high standards, and so he should.

That game should never have ended 2-1. Don’t care how many people say “uck it happens every now and then”. Too many games are finishing with a one goal margin when they shouldn’t be.

All it takes is a VAR handball and it’s 2-2.

 

Going by the videos of him raging at the Aussie team for conceding a goal...he'd have been absolutely fuming at half time.

 

Will be interested to see what he does, I think the team we had out was pretty strong on paper. I don't think Hatate and O Riley were fantastic and I don't think they were terrible, but I'm guessing he'll change it in the middle.

 

One of them is definitely getting dropped..

I think possibly O'Riley..

 

Glad to see that reaction. You could tell he was raging during the second half whenever the camera panned to him.

 

Wouldn't be against us slightly changing the midfield and playing Haksabanovic as a 10, with McGregor and Hatate behind him.

 

Think he'll drop Jota

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Thought Turnbull done well when he came on, was pinning them in their own box looking for a wee pass to slice them up. Didn't quite come off but looked dangerous. I'd start him on Saturday and drop either one of O'Riley/Hatate.

In fact I'd drop both and go with Mooy. He looked sharp as * when he came on.

 

Everything Ange Postecoglou had to say to club television in the immediate aftermath of Celtic's SPFL Premiership match against Livingston at Parkhead...

What are your thoughts tonight about the victory and the performance?

I guess the victory was obviously good, another win, but the performance not so good. We started the game well but I just thought we lacked a little bit of a cutting edge in the front third to take advantage of our dominance. But having said that, at 2-0 the game should have been over. The most disappointing thing is that we allowed a really soft goal. We've been pretty good this year and last year at not conceding soft goals and that was a really soft one.

The pattern of the game in the first staff seemed to continue from the weekend - it was dominance in attack against defence and lots of balls going across the front of the goal... were you slightly frustrated that you weren't further ahead, even before the second goal?


Yeah, but I think that was our own doing because we just didn't have enough numbers in the box. We know we're getting into those areas, we know the way the balls coming and you've have got to work hard to get in there and people just weren't working hard enough to get into those areas. There's some really good opportunities that we missed to score goals. So that's something we're need to keep working on and emphasising with the guys but, like I said, at 2-0 at half-time the game should have been over and we should have been able to control it better in the second half.

Credit to Kyogo, he did get on the end and it's a good finish for someone who could do with a wee boost of confidence in front of goal?

Yeah, look, I don't know if you need to boost the confidence, I just think he's just got to keep doing what he's doing. He's scored tonight and he got into a couple of good areas again where he could have scored a couple more so he's just got to keep getting to those positions. But we can't rely on just one player to score a goal, we need more bodies in there and we didn't have enough tonight.

Was there any disruption to the rhythm having to take Anthony [Ralston, injured] off and not having a natural replacement on the side of the pitch?

I don't think it affected us too badly. I mean, it was obviously a bit of a challenge for Greg to be on that side but the funny thing is we've got three right-backs at the club but unfortunately one's ineligible, one's away and one got injured. That's the way things go sometimes but I don't think that was the reason - we didn't really take control of the game in the second half and were just a bit anxious about things.

It looked as though it may have been put to bed with a third goal [ruled out by VAR] - have you had the chance to analyse or assess it?

Nah, I won't be. I said a few weeks ago I wouldn't talk about VAR anymore. They made the decision and we need to take it.

Looking forward to the weekend, obviously Anthony has picked up an injury. Will that mean having to shuffle things around a little bit in the squad?

We'll see. In terms of Anthony we'll see how he pulls up, hopefully it's nothing serious. But, on performance alone, I think there'll be some changes for sure.

 

Agreed. Don't think O'Riley and Hatate did too much wrong. They gave the ball away sloppily a couple times, but there was certainly no lack of effort on their part. I've noticed however that Jota has been really late a number of times the past 2 games in getting to the back post when balls have been pinged across the box. I suspect Hacksaw will replace him.

 

Unacceptable' - Ange Postecoglou slams Celtic players who 'weren't doing their jobs' in win over Livingston
Celtic manager Ange Postecoglou was moved to describe has team’s decision-making in the penalty box “unacceptable” as he was left unenthused by aspects of their 2-1 win over Livingston

A plethora of balls drilled into the area found no takers to ensure an uncomfortable spell in the second period for his team - a goal conceded straight after going 2-0 up on the stroke of half time - and the upshot was the Australian subsequently questioning the approach of his attackers.

“It’s not [about being] clinical; it’s just being disciplined and being in those areas,” the Celtic manager said. “We still created chances but those numbers should be greater if we got on the end of things. It’s unacceptable – we work on it constantly so players know they should be in that area. People in the box weren’t doing their jobs. Balls flashed across goal but people weren’t there. It’s disappointing because we work on that constantly.



We’ve had a lot of success playing that way so when it doesn’t happen I get frustrated because there’s no reason we shouldn’t do it. At 2-0 the game should have been over. We conceded a soft goal which we’ve not done a lot of either. We lost concentration for a moment. The second half was OK. We controlled the game but there wasn’t a great deal of rhythm.


It’s not anticipation because we know what’s going to happen. We work on it constantly. People said last week we’ve scored 200 goals and a lot have been like that. Maybe it’s human nature and people maybe think there are other ways to score. I was disappointed we didn’t take advantage of the chances we created.

 

Definitely Jota who’ll get dropped. Think it’ll be Maeda who comes in for him. Haksa was just as guilty of ball watching when Abada had a shot late in the 2nd half that went across the face of the goal, Maeda would have got on the end to tap it in.

 

Ange makes it to Christmas again

 

Hatate wasn't great early on. Some bizarre decision making/attempted passes in the first 15 mins.

 

I was thinking Forrest is due a run in the team. Looked lively at Pittodrie

 

Agreed brings something different he's direct but call with his passing

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Always looks like he's posing for a Kodak moment

 

Aye Maeda is a stick on to come in, I think. For all his faults he is outstanding at making those runs Ange was referring to, gets so many goals like that.