Neil Lennon was left angry and frustrated by another spot kick miss as Kris Commons’ penalty was saved by Peter Enckleman.
It was the second penalty miss of the season with the hoops boss having already watched Gary Hooper and Anthony Stokes fail twice from 12 yards this year with Georgios Samaras missing a crucial penalty at Ibrox in May.
Ki Sung Yeung looks like the next choice penalty taker but after watching Celtic lose for the first time this season Lennon was in no mood to spare Commons’ feelings.
While not reaching the depths of anger that he experienced after losing a Scottish Cup semi final to Ross County there was no doubting the dismay of the Celtic boss.
He said: “I don’t understand why he shaped up to take it that way because when he practises in training he has a totally different run-up.
“He has taken two steps to the right and I don’t know why and he’s slipped when he has take it. It was a pretty poor penalty.
“That’s two we have missed this season. I don’t know how many we have missed, it might be six out of nine, it is nowhere near good enough.
“When you get a penalty I expect us to be one-nil up.”
With Gary Hooper out injured Celtic have failed to find the net in two home matches.
Hooper has only scored once this season but provides a perfect foil for Anthony Stokes and links up well with the central midfielders.
The former Scunthorpe striker could be back to face Sion on Thursday but there was no hiding from Lennon’s anger at losing three home points.
He added: “The longer the games goes on and it’s nil-nil, you give the opposition encouragement.
“I’m fed up with it and fed up with us missing penalties, that would have given us a real good start.
“In the final third again we were awful. It was immature. That is one way to describe it
“Paddy gets in and he has the whole goal to aim at and he hits the post and it bounces out to James Forrest and he panics and hits the defender.
“My front six were bang average and I am more angry with them than anyone else. We hit the post a couple of times but we missed simple chances.”
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Not good enough, and if Lennon can’t get us the league this season, his time will be up!!
We need more experience in the team & a good up & coming striker. Someone like Malmos Daniel Larsson. Scott Brown, Maloney, Mulgrew, Murphy & the like aren’t going to win us the title & Forster is ‘bang average’ too.
It is obvious that a centre-back and a striker are a must. It has been obvious for months. Yet here we go again, last week of the transfer window, and it is looking more likely that we will ship players out rather than get them in. Surely certain individuals have been scouted.
The board have been waiting on Rangers imploding and then going into administration. Someone please tell them IT IS NOT GOING TO HAPPEN. Regardless of the on-going investigations/obsession by Celtic supporters into the financial mess at Ibrox the facts are that they have won the league three years running despite being on their knees and losing their two best strikers. Who cares if they are bankrupt? They are winning.
And if the Celtic board believe that the team will be playing in front of crowds in excess of 40,000 if Rangers win four in a row they are dreaming.
This is not a knee-jerk reaction to a one-off ‘off game’. It has been clear to all that if Celtic lose certain players to injury (something which is always going to happen) they become a struggling team. Anthony Stokes is a different player without Hooper. And we cannot moan about injuries. Did anyone see the Rangers team today? And they went to the team sitting top of the league and won 3-0. It needs to be sorted out now.
Ten days and the window bangs shut.
Great balance sheet.
Good first 11 any injuries and we,re struggling.
So decision time for the board spend some cash or pay the consequences.
I won’t hold my breath on any new quality signings.
Were has all our ambition gone.
Three league titles lost to a team on there knees don’t think the board will survive 4.
HH.
No good moaning about Commons missing a pen…he hasn’t kicked a ball all season so ask why he STARTED far less took a penalty.
The front 6 were bang average…not rated that high in my book and the defence were woeful…Maybe ask why such consistent under-performers keep getting a jersey, where is Plan B…just now stop Stokes and we have HEE HAW….Rangers must be laughing their socks off AGAIN.
Lennon and the board have 10 days to sort this out or it is going to blow up in our face again.
Stating the obvious we are mince, Kayal and izzy are quality but look at the rest and what are you left with, I read last week that stokes in undropable, this guy has never scored a goal in a big game, and please spare me the goals he scored,very ordinary , we as Celtic fans are getting caught up with watching crap each week.
St Johnstone is the last straw for me, we are accepting of very average players like mulgrew, wilson, danny, ledley, stokes, matthews, forster, murphy lol, mccourt, maloney, samaras and the list goes on, Lennon and the board are all culpable, sort it out quickly or get out.
We’ve far to many players not willing to put in a shift for their wages, where are all our young players who won the league with the under19s last year? Surely these bhoys have the desire and hunger, we defo need a new centre back and a striker and FF is defo not the answer he will cost us more points than he will win us this season with his punchn the ball instead of catching it!!
And James above aye agree with your list of players but how can you say Ledley is average he’s been won of our most consistent players since he signed he does alot of the dirty work which goes unnoticed he doesn’t get the praise he deserves the bhoy is a class player very underratted
HAIL HAIL
The most worrying thing to me is our lack of ability to change during a game. we have to learn if its not going our way, or it is going our way and we still cant score, we have to be able to adapt and change the pattern during a game.
Too often other teams know how to frustrate us and we just keep doing the same things over and over. Putting Paddy on for 5-10 mins an expecting him to do miracles is not an option,Lenny has to give him longer.
Every team in the SPL or Europe if we progress will know exactly how to play against us after this.
Why wasn’t Cha playing today?
We have options, it seems to me Lenny’s stubborn streak could be our undoing this season.