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Celtic turned on the style to bury Motherwell 5-0 in the SPFL at Fir Park.
Five days after hitting seven past Hearts Neil Lennon’s side maintained the same high standards against Stuart McCall’s side.
Celtic lost twice in three visits to Motherwell last season but a repeat never looked in store although it took until the 43rd minute to break the deadlock when Kris Commons back-heeled the ball into the net after link up play from Teemu Pukki and Anthony Stokes.
The hoops should have been awarded a penalty earlier when Stevie Hammell handled a cross from Scott Brown but referee Stevie McLean awarded a corner rather than point to the penalty spot.
While Motherwell had a bad night it was McLean who put in the worst performance of the day handing out a second half booking to Pukki after he was clearly chopped in the penalty box.
That incident came shortly after Efe Ambrose’s header had put Celtic 2-0 in front with the defender celebrating his goal with a quadruple flip to the delight of his team-mates.
Among the many highlights of the performance the return to form of Emilio Izaguirre was one of the most pleasing with the left-back creating goal number three for Commons with a stinging drive that fell perfectly for the club’s top scorer.
Stokes scored Celtic’s fourth from a perfectly weighted pass from Pukki with Bahrudin Atajic scoring his first goal for the club with a neat chip in the 87th minute to complete a memorable night in the Lanarkshire winter.
When a referee makes such a deplorable decision like the one to give a yellow card to Pukki from a mere ten feet away, you just have to shake your head and get on with it. Lennon said last week refs have to start explaining their big decisions right after a game and this supports his statement.
The ref can now keep his mouth shut and use time to think of some excuse like the old favourite, ” I was unsighted”. But these idiots could gain respect if they were just honest and applied the same rules for all teams.
If he came out and said, “I was wrong” he would gain respect. Yet after producing a yellow card to the Motherwell captain, he allowed him to commit four more terrible fouls and continue to constantly argue with every decision, while never letting up on disputing his yellow card.
Can you imagine that having been Brown or Mulgrew? You know its bad when they are so blatant. The good things are that performances like this render even the most biased and bigotted refs like McLean and Collum last week, helpless.
I’d be kind if I said the ref was useless 2 stonewallers turned down and booking Pukki was farcical
Good win last night.
Hope the bhoys can keep this form up.
We seem to keep going when we are winning with a hunger to get more goals, which i am liking.
Izzy was outstanding last night along with a few others, Commons, Van Dyke and Ambrose.
Bring on Barca. 🙂
Hope we put on a good show and who knows, pick up a point or three.
Every point matters, more in the Celtic kitty.
The only sour thing about last night being at the game and watching it after was the flares and the seats broken.
Celtic fans dont need to resort to this sort of thing. Leave that for the Sevconians.
Those who behaved like that last night should be ashamed.
What is unforgivable with these penalty decisions..is the referee’s position….
In both cases he is close to the incidents and has a clear view of both….
So to come to the conclusions he has …..means one of two things….
He’s either totally incompetent….or more likely….totally anti-Celtic….
I know you can’t appeal yellow cards…but I hope we shout loud and clear about these incidents…
Utterly disgraceful…..
That ref was not doing his job–2 penalty decisions against Celtic. I remember Jock Stein saying years ago–at times you have to beat the ref and the 2 linesmen when you are playing the opposition. HAIL HAIL.
Not 1, not 2 but 3 stonewallers and Pukki gets booked ! Whose the mason in the black !
Last two games exactly what the doctor ordered. That’s the passion and flair we expect every time we take to the field.
The ref’s are not worthy of comment when we make their job easier by “knocking” the other team out.
Dont want to get too carried away and paper over cracks as just imagine what we could achieve with an absolute predator striker and a midfield maestro????
To the cretins who threw flares and destroyed seats at Fir Park ” I hope you are really proud of yourselves” because no one else in the Celtic family is.
I am 100% behind the club in finding out who these cretins are and banning them for life. They are the lowest of the low for intimidating and frightening decent fans.
hail hail
I don’t go to away games any more because its just random who you will be sitting next to.
We have a hooligan element in our support and it is time that the club and the authorities dealt with them.
They are an embarrassment and a bit smelly. Instead of breaking seats and throwing flares they should stay in and have a bath
And after they have a bath they should have another bath. Carbolic soap and steel wool is required to cleanse these smelly creatures.
drawkcab,
A bit OTT,smelly ?
Mispent youth I would suggest.
I am nearly 50, I was no angel when
in my teens,you sound as if you must
have been a choirboy ?
Pleased for big Efe, great goal and
celebration.Defence doing Well ( pun
intended ) Chances created at will.
Quality strikers still required.
Well done to Celtic for taking action against the green brigade.
Just hope none of them are relocated near me.