Celtic’s Embarrassment of Glitches.​

As the dust settles on a frustrating afternoon at Ibrox – with the missed opportunity to extend the lead at the top of the SPL table to seven points, against a poor Rangers outfit – headlines today will quite rightly revolve around Celtic’s abject failure to defend professionally.

Time after time already this season, we have hung our collective heads in both horror and shame as a result of defensive profligacy – from Gary Caldwell’s “deft” touch resulting in a Colin Samuel goal back in August, to Suso Santana’s opener at Celtic Park only two weeks ago.

Caldwell - missed out yesterday, after earlier failures.​

Sadly, the last week has seen us all witness much worse. Thursday’s loss of a 3rd minute goal to Rapid Vienna – in what was billed as a must-win encounter – was the result of diabolical decision making. Club captain Stephen McManus was fully to blame, trying to pass the ball out of defense and failing miserably. The end result? A breakaway goal, with the Bhoys chasing yet another game right from the off.

Alas, more was still to come. Yesterday’s capitulation at the back gifted Rangers three points, on a day when they were there for the taking. The look of disbelief on the face of “prolific” Kenny Miller when he had scored his second goal, with a mere 16 minutes on the clock, said it all. Both goals were softly conceded, with Celtic gaffer Tony Mowbray summing them up perfectly: “Long punts down the middle, allowing the ball to bounce. You could’ve driven a bus through the gaps. I’m disappointed with both the goals we lost.”

Miller’s second goal in particular was hard to accept; the diminutive front man seemingly out-muscling Glenn Loovens in a David v Goliath clash, which David won with alarming ease.

Loovens - poor performance against Rangers.​

While Celtic bossed the majority of proceedings – despite the absence of preferred full backs Hinkel and Fox – those two calamitous errors lost Celtic the game. Put simply, they were unacceptable mistakes at this level, and a rather tragic indictment of the performance of our centre backs so far this season.

While Mowbray stopped short of a tirade post-match, it was clear from his comments that NONE of his centre backs have sufficiently impressed him enough to ensure a first-team berth:

Mowbray stated: “Defenders have to prove to me they should play in my team. They have to step up to the mark and improve on a domestic and European level. None of our central defenders has shown himself to be an established first-team regular, and you can see that from my selection from game to game. No two players are doing so brilliantly they’ve convinced me to leave the third defender sitting beside me on the bench every week. I wish that was the case.”

Strong words from the manager, but they are both necessary and accurate. While Celtic rightly top the SPL table, they do so by an insufficient number of points when considering Rangers’ shoddy start to the season. Unless there is a significant improvement at the back in the next three months, no-one would bet on Caldwell, McManus and Loovens still being at the club come the start of February.

DM​