Oh what the heck. Just for Borussia... 24 July 2011 Scottish Premier League Easter Road HIBERNIAN 0 CELTIC 2 (Stokes 13, Ki 63) HIBERNIAN (4-4-2): Stack; Booth, Hanlon, O’Hanlon (Stephens 61), Murray (Crawford 84); Sproule, Thornhill, Stevenson (Galbraith 70), Wotherspoon; Palsson, O’Connor Subs not used: Brown, Scott, Taggart, De Graaf CELTIC (4-4-2): Zaluska; M. Wilson, Loovens, K. Wilson, Izaguirre; Commons (Forrest 59), Ki, Kayal, Ledley; Hooper (Maloney 85), Stokes (Samaras 78) Subs not used: Cervi, Mulgrew, Matthews, Wanyama A comfortable stroll today against an admittedly very weak looking Hibs side. They'll be lucky to beat last seasons finish of 10th if that performance was anything to go by. It ended up a stroll but we didn't play well at all in the first 45mins. I think 'sluggish' would sum it up perfectly. We defended well enough, although there wasn't a great deal to defend against, but from middle to front we were poor. Our first goal came from a keeper error when Stack misjudged a deep free kick to the back post. He fumbled it away and Anthony Stokes controlled well and produced an excellent finish from a tight angle. Our only decent attacking move of the first half between Wilson, Commons and Hooper should have counted as the 2nd goal but Wilson was incorrectly pulled back for being offside after finishing well. Thankfully we stepped it up in the 2nd half and totally dominated. Kayal and Ki, in particular, ran the show and we cruised to victory. Ki scored with a left footer low across the keeper from 20yds that nestled into the corner of the net and that was that. Although we still had time to miss a penalty (same old, same old) and have Hooper pulled back for an offside when he was clean through against the keeper. Lets forget about the fact that he was actually inside his own half when the through ball was released... Kelvin Wilson had a very good debut but wasn't troubled much by O'Connor. He did show a good turn of pace though to catch up with Sproule and get between him and the ball at the start of the 2nd half. And all the worries about Zaluska starting were completely unfounded as he didn't have 1 single save to make in the whole 90mins. So all in all a good start to the campaign. And the inevitable questions start appearing such as... 1. Where will the captain (Scott Brown) fit into the team now he is available from suspension again? 2. How many more clean sheets can we keep with big Glenda at the back? (although he didn't put a foot wrong today) 3. How much playing time will young Forrest get this season? (he looked electric when he came on as a sub due to being totally injury free at last)
Transfers so far ---- IN's Kelvin Wilson (Notts Forest) - CB. Good season debut. Has pace(thank god), positional awareness and looks comfortable on the ball. The real deal? Time will tell. Adam Matthews (Cardiff City) - RB. Young RB who will surely see some playing time this season, although a lot of that may depend on Mark Wilson's fitness and form and also that of Cha Du-Ri. Victor Wanyama (GBA) - DM/CB. A defensive mid by trade so far but NL has made noises about using him as a CB. The CM/DM area is congested enough at this minute in time so appearances may be limited to cup matches and sub ins. At least for the early part of his Celtic career. OUT's Paul McGowan (St Mirren) - AM. Gowser has now made the permanent switch to Paisley after playing on loan their all of last season. Good luck to him. Ben Hutchinson (Kilmarnock) - CF. Has stayed in the SPL and has moved down to Ayrshire to play for Kilmarnock. Niall McGinn (Brentford) - W. Has joined League 1 side Brentford on a loan deal. Andreas Hinkel (Free) - RB. Has been released by the club. Freddie Ljungberg (Free) - F. Has been released by the club.
Hibs - Celtic (goals) [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV1SXOi7vxo"]Hibernian - Celtic 0-2 ( 24 Juli 2011 )‏ - YouTube[/ame]
Thanks for the breakdown as always fraser. I was going to watch, but I got my dang days mixed up (thought the game was tomorrow, doh). Oh well, excited to get the new season underway. Hopefully this year we can finish this thing the right way.
Wow, just for me? Thanx. Great season start ... somehow I can't really judge the competitiveness of the current squad, though (especially with regard to the upcoming international games). Btw: There's really to Hibs CB's named Hanlon & O'Hanlon? LOL.
I get to see the Bhoys play live pretty much never, so I'm super excited to be able to catch their two Dublin Super Cup matches this weekend versus Inter on Saturday and Airtricity League XI on Sunday.
Should be fun. Considered going but Dublin ain't the cheapest place for a weekend football tournament so opted out in favour of a Europa league away game (hopefully).
http://www.celticfc.net/newsstory?item=1320 EFRAIN Juarez has joined Real Zaragoza on a season-long loan. The Mexican internationalist, who has made 20 appearances for Celtic, scoring two goals, joins the Spanish side who are currently managed by his fellow countryman, Javier Aguirre. They finished 13th in La Liga last season. Everyone at Celtic would like to wish Efrain every success with Real Zaragoza for the forthcoming season. Good luck to him. His career at Celtic started well but tailed off badly and he was way out of the first team picture so it's best he moves somewhere for regular first team football.
Didn't get up for the pre-season friendly 2-0 defeat to Wolves so can't really comment on it. We play Internazionale in Dublin today with kick off at 4.30pm GMT. CELTIC (4-4-1-1) Zaluska; Cha, K. Wilson, Loovens, Izaguirre; Brown, Kayal, Ledley, Mulgrew; Maloney; Samaras Subs yet to be confirmed. EDIT: CELTIC (4-4-1-1) Zaluska; Cha, K. Wilson, Loovens, Izaguirre; Brown, Kayal, Ledley, Mulgrew; Maloney; Samaras Subs: Cervi, Matthews, Twardzik, Majstorovic, Hooper, Stokes, McCourt, Wanyama, Murphy INTER (3-4-3) Castellazzi; Ranocchia, Samuel, Chivu; Santon, Stankovic, Motta, Nagatomo; Pandev, Pazzini, Castaignos Subs: Eto’o, Sneijder, Alvarez, Caldirola, Mariga, Obi, Faraoni, Biancheti, Crisetig, Natalino, Muntari
There will be more injuries in this game if the referee does not take action and the Celtic players continue to launch into tackles. Inter are treating this like a friendly but Celtic are treating this like a competitive match. The end result is Inter are slower on the ball and Celtic are pressing them hard. The Inter players are now getting angry with the inaction from the referee and are responding in kind. Two yellow cards for Inter now after 15 minutes (Motta and Stankovic) with one player already off injured. There has been several flare ups thus far. Inter went 1-0 ahead with one of their first attacks after a good through-ball and great finish from Castaignos.
But guys like Pandev are allowed to just kick out at players off the ball because that isn't going to antagonise the situation much is it... How many players have been booked so far and who do they play for...? And it was a very nice finish for the goal. Incidentally, you make it sound like Nagatomo was injured due to a bad challenge from a Celtic player which you know is not the case.
The fact that only Inter players have been booked highlights how poorly this has been officiated. You cannot allow one team to consistently foul but then take action when the other responds in kind. He needs to get a grip of the game and calm things down. Injuries suit no-one. I did not state that the Nagatomo injury and substitution was the result of a bad tackle. What I did say was his injury would be the first of many if the pattern of play continues. Your victim mentality flared up very early this season. No?
It's ingrained into me. I also believe Inter are more than capable of handling themselves and are dishing out as much as they are receiving.
Inter are more than capable which is why there is a risk of injury if the referee does not calm things down. Thankfully we are currently in a lull before the next flare-up. Anyway some shocking defending from Inter gives Celtic two good chances but the keeper makes the double save. It should be 1-1.
It should have been but Charlie Mulgrew doesn't have a right foot so all he could do was swing at it rather than place it.
More poor officiating. Motta gets his second yellow and is sent off just before half time. He barely touched Brown, who reacted by shoving Motta away and screaming at the referee. How Brown escaped caution or why Motta has been send off while Loovens gets away with repeatedly fouling Pazzini is beyond me. Anyway a long punt forward, Zaluska hesitates and the ball is flicked into the back of the net. Inter 2-0 Celtic. Half-time.
Even though Motta dragged his studs on the back of his ankle!?! Come on Teso, really? ... and that is why we need a keeper...
Why is Motta sent off for two incidents when Brown and Loovens have been allowed to get away with countless fouls? It is poor officiating. The referee allowed Celtic to get away with their early fouling and then took action when Inter responded in kind. He was not even in a position to see what Motta did and responded to Brown's reaction. Brown did a good job there. He was barely touched and knew that Motta was on a yellow so he shoves him away, gesticulates to the referee and then pats Motta on the chest triumphantly once he has got him sent off. Now the referee has set himself up for a very difficult second half as he has set a precedent that a foul now equals a booking. He has ruined the game as a spectacle. Eto'o on for Pandev and Sneijder on for Castaignos.
So, are you suggesting that Motta wasn't a mile late and didn't know what he was doing...? Motta is blameless...?
Motta knew exactly what he was doing. He was doing a bit of enforcement on Brown as the referee was not doing anything to stop him. Unfortunately for Motta he was done by Brown being very clever with his reaction resulting in the second yellow card being shown. Irrespective this game has been poorly officiated from the off. EDIT: Brown FINALLY booked. It only took another late foul and a double knee drop WWE style on the prone player... EDIT2: There have now been three yellow cards in the opening six minutes of the second half. As I said previously the referee has lost it with his poor officiating in the first half. If he is going to be consistent it would not surprise me if more players were sent off. Things are still simmering between the sides.
*yawn* I was thinking the exact same thing about Stankovic. But at least I had a sensible reason for it...
I see the ref missed a shocking straight leg stamp from Samuel on Brown... Should have been another red for the Italians. Teso probably missed it as well...
Why was Samuel not carded for his high challenge? Why was Samaras not carded for his tackle from behind just there? The referee is now keeping his cards in his pocket. No doubt he will continue to do so and allow fouls to go unpunished until someone either opts for theatrics or puts in a tackle that does cause damage and everything will kick off yet again. This is some of the poorest officiating I have seen.