Scott Brown

SCOTT Brown, the Celtic captain, last night launched a savage attack on Graeme Shinnie, his Aberdeencounterpart who was called into the Scotland squad this week, and claimed he lacked quality and could only compete with him by fouling.

Brown was the victim of a shocking late challenge by Shinnie in the final Ladbrokes Premiership match of the 2017/18 campaign at Celtic Park on Sunday.

The midfielder confirmed he will be fine to play against Motherwell in the William Hill Scottish Cup final at Hampden this Saturday – a game which his side need to win to become the first to complete a double treble.

But he savaged his opponent, who he exchanged a few terse words with at the end of the match at the weekend, claimed he had “not got great quality” and described his foul as a “little boy’s tackle”.

“The ankle’s fine,” said Brown. “It takes more than that to keep me down. It was a Graeme Shinnie tackle. It sums him up really.

“We had a nice wee chat afterwards. I’ve matured. He was saying that he got close to the ball. But I watched it back and it is kind of a little boy’s tackle – waiting until I was past him. My pace obviously done him in his prime and I got past him.”

Shinnie, who was named in Alex McLeish’s 24-man squad for the end-of-season tour of Peru and Mexico on Monday, had been unrepentant when he was interviewed on television and said “what goes around comes around”.

But Brown responded: “I’m not the one with 15 bookings this season. I think Graeme runs about, he tackles, stuff like that. He’s not got great quality, but he does the best he possibly can.




“It’s the only thing he can probably do to try and stop us – to try and make a bad tackle. To be fair on him, it was a good bad tackle.”

Brown took some time to recover from the foul, which Shinnie was booked for, but he stressed he would be alright to start for Celtic against their top flight rivals Motherwell this weekend.

“My ankle locks now and then,” he said. “It has got no ligaments left in it. It kind of locked. I just needed to open it up again.”

“I felt it quite high up at the time. I was thinking ‘thank goodness I still wear those grandad shinnies that come all the way around and protect everything!’ It wasn’t too bad. I have had worse, but it wasn’t great, especially at the time of year. But as soon as I got up I knew it would be alright.”

Brown stressed he has no concerns about facing Motherwell on Saturday despite the Fir Park club’s renowned uncompromising approach to games.

“We’ve played Motherwell quite a lot this season so we know how they play,” he said. “They are physical but they’re very fair. They use their bodies and they don’t lunge in to tackles or do stupid challenges. It’s up to the striker and they play off second balls.

“We like the physical battle as well, we showed that against Hearts. We tried in the first half to keep and pass the ball but we realised the grass was like a jungle so we couldn’t really do that.

“So we got our big guys out and played it into them and they bullied the Hearts centre-halves. We’ve done it against Motherwell as well. We play it into Moussa (Dembele) and play off second balls. We’ve got that in our locker as well.”

 

Good stuff. Should be tasty against they sheep * * next season. Wasn't too fussed on us losing to them but the way they acted towards the end and after the game has been embarrassing. Really hope somebody does that Logan * a belter next season.

 

Seems to be some sort of concerted effort to prove you are a plastic hardman by fouling Broony. Now happens every game. Yet rarely happens in a 50-50.......

 

Lol, brilliant.

 

That is excellent!!!

 

Hit the nail on the head there. All season he has had folk trying to 'prove themselves' by fouling him, which I don't even understand tbh. Obviously Brown is a physical payer but he's hardly the biggest or most intimidating of boys. If Shinnie wanted to prove himself to be a hard man he should have tried to go in like that on big Wanyama when he was here.

 

The tackles on him this season has been a * disgrace....i blame the refs more for not dealing with it quicker though,the foul count is shocking on him.

 

"He's not got great quality, but he does the best he possibly can"

How demoralising

 

32 yellow cards in two seasons that * has had.

Broony has described him perfectly too.

 

Bet that hurts more than any late tackle......

 

* putting in these sickener tackles into Brown. Refs need to stamp it out next season. Twice is a coincidence, 3+ is a trend

 

Great Player and world class captain. Under Delia I thought he was past his best, and from his own comments he thought that might be the case.

Scott Brown has become a genuine Celtic Legend and will become the Celtic High King when he picks up number 10.

 

I've always said Brown has been on the cusp, he needs to do something more than just being a long serving captain.

Today he has just done that. Capped off a great personal season with being the captain that drove us to a history making double treble.



Scott Brown - Celtic Legend.

 

he was godlike again today

 

Quite simply....... EXCEPTIONAL

 

16 trophies for us

 

He's a legend. It's not even up for debate.