Champions League Atalanta V Celtic Wednesday October 23 kick off 5:45 TNT Sports 4

Me too posted this earlier in the thread.

 

Can't see us getting anything but I'd like to see lessons learned and an improved performance from Dortmund.

 

4-0 Fatalanta

 

I like that a lot bud

We have the players and pace to spring in to attack and counter well. Got enough good ball players also in that lineup..

That midfield trio needs more support as Dortmund away showed and our defence isn't good enough/also needs far more protection..

 

Oh well, we know Rodgers will go toe to toe..

 

Mad that one of the big points being made in Rodgers favour was he'd make us more solid in Europe.

Wednesday is going to be interesting if nothing else.

 

Well, in comparison with Ange..

Not much in it..

 

Ange in Europe, felt like we were more confident than now in all honesty. No idea why though

 

I guess no matter what happens on Wednesday, we're still in with a reasonable chance of progressing..

 

That's what I would do too.
I wonder if he will.

 

Maybe . It's certainly the best draw/fixtures we could have hoped for.

 

Exactly as I felt before Dortmund: we won't judge our season on these games. There are a number of winnable ties in this CL campaign and I'll judge Rodgers on those and on the league.

 

Well win the league surely? You think that's even in doubt?

 

I'd say we are strong favourites; but I don't take it for granted.

 

Fair enough. And for qualifying from the group?

 

I'd be happy if we parked the bus if need be but just hope that Trusty or Valle aren't driving it. Seriously though, I try to watch Italian football and Atalanta can cut right through teams with ease and if the sheep can do that then I dread to think what Atalanta will do

 

Team ought to just stand in the goalmouth all game.

 

I've no idea, mate. That's what makes this so exciting. I've said for years that I wish we could have the excitement of the EL with the money of the CL. I didn't think it would ever be possible to have my cake and eat it and yet here we are and I'm loving it. I was still loving it the day after Dortmund and I'll still be loving it on Thursday morning.

We're finding out gradually. I learned a bit from Bratislava: it was our easiest game, but we have lost to teams like that before and they are better than anything we face domestically. I learned nothing about the team as a whole from Dortmund except that Rodgers has an ego and we're not good enough to go toe to toe with last year's semi-finalists. Who knew? I don't expect to learn much about the team on Wednesday for the exact same reason*. I know a lot of folk read a lot into the score and the manner of the defeat, but for whatever reason, I don't.

That's not to say that I didn't learn anything about individuals in Dortmund. I learned a lot about Bernardo's lack of discipline and the mentality of Kuhn and Engels in particular... and also about Scales (on the positive side). Similarly, I expect to learn something about individuals, including Rodgers, on Wednesday.

And then on to the real tests against Brugge, Young Boys and Zagreb (and maybe Leipzig as a wildly optimistic stretch goal ha ha)! That's where we'll find out how far we have or haven't come and that's what I'll judge Rodgers on.

* Well, unless Rodgers surprises us all by channelling his inner Neil Lennon and setting us up to be hard to break down. If that happened, we'd probably learn quite a lot.

 

Sounds like you are having a ball. Good on you.

Similarly, I wasn't too upset by the Dortmund game, on the other hand my son was pretty shell-shocked by it.

If Rodgers doesn't organise us better for Wednesday I will consider that an issue though. Once is fine, but twice is just foolish. Given we gave Real Madrid a game 2 seasons ago I think we need to do similar with Atlanta or accept Rodgers is fine domestically and that's it. The other games are important too but we have to at least compete in all games to really say we are doing the minimum in Europe.