Chris Sutton has highlighted the contribution of Cameron Carter-Vickers as Ange Postecoglou’s side starts to go up through the gears.
Being a defender in a free-scoring side is never going to be easy but the on-loan Spurs defender formed a very effective barrier and partnership with Stephen Welsh.
Central defence is all about how the partnership operates, anticipating and understanding the role of their team-mate and keeping opportunities for opponents down to a minimum.
True Ferencvaros did score twice but the first was a fluke deflection while the second in the 85th minute with Celtic 3-1 up was due to sloppiness from the more attack minded players.
Last season Shane Duffy was left badly exposed in the Europa League, this season Celtic have a more attack minded outlook but defence hasn’t been neglected with Carter-Vickers and his partner knowing exactly what is expected of them.
Passing the ball back via Joe Hart rather than hoofing it up the pitch is creating time and developing confidence, opponents are worn down closing down space with the dividends shown in performances and results.
Covering his appearance on BT Sport last night the Daily Record reports Sutton saying:
Take it back to the first two games in the group. They lost those two and the pressure was on to win these two games back-to-back and they did – and deservedly so.
The team are making progress, he had a lot to deal with when he first came in, Ange Postecoglou, three players scoring tonight, three of his signings.
They are starting to gel. No-one is saying Celtic have cracked it, there’s still a long way to go and they still shoot themselves in the foot, still make mistakes. But they are getting there, and the performance tonight was a really good sign. We spoke about it at half-time, it’s a consequence of the high-risk football they play.
I’ve got to say, one who’s really impressed me is Carter-Vickers. We saw him have a hopeless game for Spurs in the Conference League and I worried about him, he was a last-minute signing in the window.
But I do think he’s really stepped up and his leadership skills at the back, the way he’s read the game, he attacks the ball when it goes into the box – he was superb tonight once again.
Celtic will always try and play their way out of trouble, there’s an argument to say Abada should have just punted the ball into the channel (on the first Ferencvaros goal) but there was nobody there and the manager would be really angry with him.
He’d say ‘this isn’t the way we want to play’. It was a misplaced pass, it was a careless pass, but Ange Postecoglou will say ‘we need to tidy up’.
They made mistakes playing out throughout the game and that’s going to be a feature of Celtic this season.
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Take a draw then Real Betis in Matchday 5
We;ll lose- this is a step too far for us
At the end of September Bayer Leverkusen handed Celtic some brutal lessons, in three weeks time the hoops have the chance for revenge as they discover how far Angeball has evolved against a side that looks like one of the favourites to lift the Europa League trophy in May.
