Liam Gormley marked his return from injury with a double strike yesterday as Celtic’s u-19 side won 5-0 away to Inverness Caley Thistle.
The win cuts Hearts lead at the top of the table down to four points with the Edinburgh side having a difficult away game at St Mirren today.
Gormley came in from the cold along with James Alabi as Celtic raced into a four goal half time lead to put the points beyond doubt.
A double from Callum McGregor plus strikes from Marcus Fraser and Gormley put Celtic in front at the interval and although Joe Chalmers was red carded five minutes into the second half Gormley added to the scoring in the scoring just past the hour mark.
“We had to make a few changes to the side but the players that came in did well, especially Liam,” coach John Kennedy said.
“Before the match we spoke to him and hoped to get a good hour out of him. Unfortunately due to a red card and a couple of injuries we had used up all of our substitutes within five minutes of the second half.
“It was pleasing to see him last the full 90 minutes. He worked his socks off and scored two well taken goals. Some of the runs that he made were very impressive.
“Liam played wide in midfield and put in a good performance. The pitch was a bit heavy so we played two up front in Tony Watt and James Alabi.
“That worked out really well for us and behind them Jackson Irvine and Callum McGregor both played very well.
“They were scrapping for everything in midfield, once we went down to ten men they were back helping out in defence and worked really hard.
“It was a good win for us and keeps the pressure on Hearts. We can only do our own job and have to look for Hearts to drop something.”
Next Saturday Celtic are at home to Kilmarnock.
CELTIC: Fasan; Fisher (Miller 50), Jones, Fraser, Chalmers:Herron (Atajic 45), Irvine, McGregor, Gormley: Watt, Alabi (Yaqub 48)
SUBS: Triailist, Kidd, Findlay
GOALS: McGregor 2, Gormley 2, Fraser
