For two years Celtic fans were treated to fast attacking football, thrilled as they watchedAnge Postecoglou send out a side geared to attack and finding the net. Regularly and often.
Last season the title was clinched in the first post match fixture with that approach.
His football had an identity and purpose, opponents were on the back foot from the kick-off, after an hour two fresh wingers came off the bench to pile it on as Postecoglou demonstrated that We Never Stop was more than a cheap slogan to bring supporters on board.
Seven months into this season those memories have almost been obliterated, stuck in the archive and replaced with nothing in particular. Just a general nothingness highlighted by the passage below.
Genuinely baffled at what our players are being told to do, this is dire
pic.twitter.com/fF4WPHyXSA— Rónán? (@Ronan1888) February 18, 2024
Five years ago Rodgers welcomed interest in Marion Shved with a comment about having about a million wingers, he is back in that situation and getting virtually nothing out of whichever two wingers he chooses to play.
Whether it is Luis Palma and Daizen Maeda or Nicolas Kuhn and Yang Hyun-jun virtually nothing comes from the flanks with wingers inclined to cut inside into already congested areas of the pitch.
Faced with effectively nine opponents managers like Derek McInnes have Celtic sussed out. Only once in four attempts has Rodgers got the better of his old Aberdeen foe this season.
For whatever reasons Rodgers insists in starting every match with two non-performing wingers which puts an even bigger burden on Callum McGregor and Matt O’Riley.
Opponents can press higher as the clip above shows, there are very few options to play the ball out of defence- standing watching this unfold game after game the manager seems too stubborn to make changes.
There is no doubt that Rodgers has been duped into returning to a set up that has little interest in what happens on the pitch as long as there is a flow of big money transfer fees coming in from Brentford, Crystal Palace or Al Ittihad.
Champions League football is an unexpected windfall as the current bank balance of around £100m demonstrates.
Even with his hands tied the Celtic boss should be able to find a way of getting more out of the players available- McInnes and others have the knack of getting the very best out of a group of players that barely required a transfer fee to bring them together with the better ones almost certain to move on in the summer.
Who is mainly to blame for Celtic's disastrous season?
Chairman- The decline started with his appointment
Manager- Not the same guy, weak and more powerless
Recruitment- you can't get over four disastrous transfer windows
You would think he could see that the present approach is simply not working at all and just go to a brutal Martin O’Neill style 3 – 4 – 1 – 2 to counter well-organised but talentless opponents with Kyogo behind Idah and Oh, using three centre backs and the full-backs can vie for wing-back slots in the starting XI…. but he was always inflexible, even back in his Liverpool days and with us first time round. While I clearly recognise he has been sold a complete pup and handicapped by the parsimonious board, the rigidity of his own approach is compounding the problem.
If the support can see and make sensible comments about this type of play…WTF does BR do all day ??…You used the word DIRE and that sums it up perfectly…and as for your analysis of the wingers…I’ve been bumpin’ ma gums about them for a long time…Nowhere near good enough…Palma is a show-off…Yang tries but hasn’t got it…Daizen is a waste of a jersey…and when Khun decides to get involved…I ‘ll let you know…As for Abada. …Let’s not go there…Nah something is seriously wrong…send for Bob The Builder.
That video clip above shows a passage of football
that we would all be absolutely OK with,
if we were 3-0 up at the time – and just killing time for the final whistle?
The clip does highlight the general lack of urgency / forward movement
in our game.
BR doesn’t seem to have much in his managerial toolbox to mix things up?
But, to be fair, I was pleased to see him actually make a change at Half-Time,
which he typically seems very reluctant to do.
He is simply too pig headed to change…
He may or may not change when it’s too late and the damage is done – (He probably won’t) –
He will find with the publicity that this (now very very potentially disastrous season brings) will see him finish up (just for something to do) at say Shrewsbury Town, Oxford United or Charlton Athletic…
But it would be pretty hellish for the poor supporters of The Shrews, The Oxen Or The Addicks to suffer the turgid and slow tippy tippy pish pot jerker football that he’d inevitably bring with him to these clubs that would invest in his ideological ‘style’ of football !
Joe, The “The Retreat for a Breather” tactic is found in Rodgers Book on Tactics for Managers.
Amazon Books have copies. Derek McInnes bought a copy and thought through every basic tactic,
plus permutations introduced by replacement wingers.
The counter for the above tactic is, “I’m in yer face, Maaate”. Derek has given Phil Clements the book
with copies of his notes, Phil threw the book in the trash can.