2018-12-05: Motherwell 1-1 Celtic, SP

Trivia

• Back to the league
• Celtic's first game since winning league cup on Sunday past.
• Kilmarnock now top on 31pts! Celtic & Sevco joint second on 30pts. Sevco lost 1-0 at home to Aberdeen,
• Celtic waste chance to go top, dropping two pts. Celtic missed a penalty (Griffiths) but a goal was wrongly disallowed scored by Benkovic. Motherwell incredibly finished with 11 men on the pitch.
• Some major changes from Sunday; Edouard on bench. Gordon, Hayes, Gambo, Simunovic, Brown & Griffiths start. Boyata out injured for a couple of weeks.
• Christie just keeps on scoring! A new star….
• Brendan Rodgers: "If you don’t take opportunities in the game, then you leave yourself vulnerable at the end. It was a disappointing goal to concede so it was definitely two-points lost.”
• Tonight in Scotland: Well get late equaliser. Dons win at Ibrox. Killie go top. A wonder goal at Easter Road. A night of interest for many. But on BBC Scotland you’ll have to wait until past midnight and after extensive highlights from England before you see any of it…; The anglocentric nature of the BBC has damaged Scottish football for years and it’s getting worse. Yet these same clowns shamelessly run endless editorials on the problems facing Scottish football without ever acknowledging that they’re one of them.
• Ex-Celt Stuart Armstrong finally seems to be settling in at Southampton, scoring v Man U in a league game too just last week (and 3 in 2 weeks), but his manager (Mark Hughes) then just got the sack.
• Hearts make big complaint public over Sevco getting a very dodgy goal when 3-4 offside.
• Dedryck Boyata is in a race against time to be fit for Celtic’s Europa League clash with Salzburg next week. The Belgian defender was taken off during the Betfred Cup final with a hamstring problem and could miss the final match in Group B as Celtic look to secure their place in the knockout stages.
• Criticism correctly made at the co-host of the Ballon d’Or after he asked Ada Hegerberg on stage if she knew how to twerk, unnecessary sexism and inappropriate. The 23-year-old Lyon striker was announced as the first ever winner of the women’s Ballon d’Or. Congrats to her and ignore that co-host.
• Celtic eSports team win their opening game 1-0 v Nantes. Good luck to them in their eFootball.pro league. @celticfcesports

Review

Brendan Rodgers defended his decision to make seven changes to his side after they spilled two points at Motherwell.The champions were held to a 1-1 draw, with Danny Johnson equalising for the hosts in the final two minutes.
Rodgers rotated heavily from Sunday's League Cup final triumph over Aberdeen, resting the likes of Tom Rogic and James Forrest.
"I can't rely on 11 players," Rodgers told BBC Scotland.
"We've got a good squad who are well paid. Of course you don't expect to be as fluent, but I would still expect us to be a lot better.
"The other boys have been going to the well for us, both in club and international football, for a period of time so you have to, and you need to, have players that can come in."

Teams

Motherwell

• 20Gillespie
• 22Donnelly Substituted fo rLivingstone at 15'minutesBooked at 26mins Substituted for Main at 72'minutes
• 5Aldred
• 6Hartley Substituted for Rose at 6'minutes
• 2Tait
• 14Grimshaw
• 8CampbellBooked at 38mins
• 4McHugh
• 28Turnbull
• 19Sammon
• 24JohnsonBooked at 35mins

• 9Main
• 12Bowman
• 13Ferguson
• 15Rose
• 17Bigirimana
• 23Gorrin
• 29Livingstone

Celtic

• 1 Gordon
• 12 Gamboa
• 5 Simunovic
• 32 Benkovic
• 63 Tierney
• 8 Brown
• 21 Ntcham Substituted for Sinclair at 45'minutes
• 15 Hayes Substituted for Rogic at 81'minutes
• 42 McGregor
• 17 Christie
• 9 Griffiths Substituted for Edouard at 66'minutes

• 3Izaguirre
• 4Hendry
• 11Sinclair
• 18Rogic
• 22Edouard
• 29Bain
• 49Forrest

Referee:Kevin Clancy
Attendance: 8,433

Articles

• Match Report (see end of page below)

Pictures

• Match Pictures

Forum

• Pre-match
• Match
• Post Match

MOTM

• Voting Thread
• Result Thread
• Winner –

Stats

MotherwellAway TeamCeltic
Possession
Home38%
Away62%
Shots
Home6
Away8
Shots on Target
Home3
Away4
Corners
Home3
Away4
Fouls
Home18
Away7

Articles

Motherwell 1 – 1 Celtic: Late Johnson goal denies Celtic top spot
Andrew Smith
Published: 22:24 Wednesday 05 December 2018
https://www.scotsman.com/sport/football/competitions/premiership/motherwell-1-1-celtic-late-johnson-goal-denies-celtic-top-spot-1-4840017
There is nothing that Brendan Rodgers has seemed unable to do in Scottish football across the past year. It is a period that has brought an unprecedented double treble and, in recent days, a seventh straight domestic honour. Winning at Fir Park, though, is proving more difficult than racking up the momentous, it would seem.

Having drawn both encounters at the ground last season, the Scottish champions looked to have cracked one of their toughest nuts in leading 1-0 through an early Ryan Christie goal when the final two minutes of normal time rolled around last night. But Stephen Robinson’s grafting side refused to let the odds – and several setbacks along the way last night – proved fatal to their hopes of an unlikely point. And Danny Johnson ensured their valour was rewarded when he produced an imperious strike in the closing seconds. The forward did so by cutting inside from the right and guiding a low diagonal drive into the far corner from 14 yards that was low and true.
Ryan Christie celebrates after putting his side in front. Picture: PA
Ryan Christie celebrates after putting his side in front. Picture: PA

A 1-0 is that most dangerous of scorelines but when Motherwell struck it was being acclaimed with cries of “we shall not be moved” from a Celtic support then convinced their team was about to go top of the league courtesy of an Aberdeen win away to Rangers. Johnson choked that chant in their throats, and his impact was to push Celtic below new Premiership pacesetters Kilmarnock.

An incredulous scenario when the gulf between Rodgers and the rest in Scottish football tends not just to exhibit itself in trophy spoils. Team sheets can prove telling too. A matter of days after a Betfred Cup success that claimed them a seventh straight domestic honour, Rodgers was able to make seven changes to his starting line-up. In itself, perhaps not arresting. What certainly proved so was that it left his Fir Park counterpart Robinson pondering whether the rejigged side was actually stronger than the one fielded at Hampden.

With James Forrest rested and Dedryck Boyata lost to injury, Jonny Hayes and Jozo Simunovic were drafted in as replacements. They would hardly be placed in the same bracket. But giving captain Scott Brown a first start since October, and preferring Olivier Ntcham, Leigh Griffiths and Craig Gordon to Scott Sinclair, Odsonne Edouard and Scott Bain would hardly be expected to prefigure a drop-off in capability.

Once the inevitably full-blooded proceedings began, it was enforced shuffling in the ranks of the home side that claimed attention. Losing to Livingston at the weekend on the back of thumping Aberdeen indicated the wildly contrasting fortunes being experienced by the Lanarkshire side. Inside five minutes, the portents suggested a downer of an evening, with captain Peter Hartley hirpling off to be replaced by Andy Rose. Little more than a quarter of an hour in, they had lost a second player to injury when Liam Donnelly had to give way to Adam Livingstone.

Serious blows, these booked one of the fully body variety, and the performer who administered it was almost predictable. There have been many career turnaround over which to marvel across the years in Scottish football, but it is difficult to think of any to match the astonishing gear shift that Ryan Christie has applied to his career.

The Betfred Cup final match winner appears to now possess such a Midas touch, the golden-plated finish he forged to put his team ahead after 13 minutes seemed of a standard hallmark.

The reality was it was nothing less than another exquisite piece of driving forward play and delightful touch. Kieran Tierney provided the set-up with a piercing run down the left, before sliding a ball inside. Christie seized on it like a bloodhound on the scent of a hare, slicing through the home backline by controlling the ball with his right before caressing a left foot effort to scoop the ball wide of Mark Gillespie.

After Motherwell then battled back, and demonstrated an ability to provide Celtic with uncomfortable moments without ever cutting them open, it was Christie’s wiles six minutes from half-time that should have offered the platform for Rodgers’ men to make their lead unassailable.

The Scotland international hustled his way to the byline, where he was surrounded by claret and amber jerseys. He stood strong at the edge of the box as he attempted to wriggle his way free, only for Rose to prove clumsy and barge him over. Referee Kevin Clancy was decisive in blowing for a penalty, and the protests from a delegation of Motherwell players proved revealing in their half-heartedness.

A second penalty for Celtic inside four days, it didn’t not share the unmerited nature of the spot-kick that came their way against Aberdeen at the national stadium. It did though prove to be just as insignificant, however, with Griffiths’ evening exemplified by Gillespie superbly throwing himself to his left to deny the striker, before clawing away the follow-up as it looked as if Griffiths had homed in to make amends.

The harem-scarem nature of the tussle in the first period gave way to a second period that was more mundane. The arrival of Scott Sinclair in place of a Ntcham who had never looked at ease in a wide left role, allowed Celtic to raid regularly down the left, but Robinson’s men stood firm.

They never allowed themselves to be counted out, with the switch of Edouard for Griffiths and later Tom Rogic for Hayes, not providing the visitors with the impetus to remove the shackles. Such endeavour brought a dramatic climax.

And that most dangerous of scorelines proved exactly that to Celtic when a courageous Motherwell forced an opportunity from a diagonal ball that Johnston need no second invitation to bury. In that instant the cries of “we shall not be moved” from a Celtic support then convinced their team was about to go top of the league courtesy of an Aberdeen win away to Rangers were choked in their throats.

BBC

By Scott Mullen

BBC Sport Scotland at Fir Park

From the section Scottish Premiership

Highlights: Motherwell 1-1 Celtic

Danny Johnson's late goal earned Motherwell a precious Scottish Premiership point and prevented Celtic returning to the top of the table.

Brendan Rodgers' side looked like returning to the summit thanks to Ryan Christie's sumptuous goal – his sixth in nine games – but they are now third.

Leigh Griffiths had a first-half spot-kick saved by Mark Gillespie and Filip Benkovic had an effort disallowed.

Johnston skidded a late shot past Craig Gordon to earn an unlikely draw.

Champions Celtic now trail Kilmarnock by a point – albeit with two games and hand – and are behind Rangers on goal difference.

On Saturday, Celtic host Kilmarnock, whose manager Steve Clarke has yet to lose to the Parkhead club in his spell at Rugby Park.

Motherwell, whose best chance before the goal was a Conor Sammon shot straight at Gordon, stay ninth – six points clear of the relegation play-off place.

Reaction & as it happened

Christie class amid chaos

Most of the discussion pre-match was on who had been left out of the Celtic team.

From Sunday's League Cup final win there were seven changes in total, including Odsonne Edouard, Tom Rogic and James Forrest all dropping out, with captain Scott Brown among those returning.

However, it did not take long into proceedings at a misty Fir Park for the headlines to turn to one man who is now an integral part of the Celtic team.

Sitting narrow on the left of midfield, Christie was unplayable at times, particularly early on as Motherwell – who lost captain Peter Hartley after six minutes to injury – were pushed deeper and deeper.

On 13 minutes, the man who won Rodgers his seventh trophy as Celtic manager at the weekend demonstrated his class.

With the hosts' defence a man light while Liam Donnelly was off receiving treatment, Christie gathered the ball in the Motherwell box with a neat first touch before a crisp finish across Gillespie arrowed into the far corner.

It was a game of few chances as Stephen Robinson's side were so focussed on repelling Celtic that they struggled to create opportunities of their own.

Ten minutes after taking the lead, Benkovic had the ball in the net and the large travelling support celebrated only for referee Kevin Clancy to rule it out for a tug in the box.

With half-time approaching, the home side could have fallen further behind.

Christie was again at the heart of it, with a rash challenge from Andy Rose bringing him down inside the penalty area. Griffiths stepped up, but Gillespie was equal to his spot kick, diving superbly to his left before then punching clear.
Leigh Griffiths
Leigh Griffiths's penalty was saved by Mark Gillespie

Motherwell emerged stronger in the second half and pushed back the Celtic tide.

An Allan Campbell shot straight at Gordon gave them hope before Sammon saw a low shot smothered by the Scotland keeper.

The chance looked to have gone for Motherwell but, in the dying seconds, with Celtic clinging on, they struck to claim a precious point.

The ball broke to Johnson on the left edge of the box, and with a swipe of his left foot, his shot evaded Gordon's grasp and hit the far post before ruffling the net.
Motherwell resilience to the fore – analysis

BBC Scotland's Alasdair Lamont at Fir Park

Just as they did twice last season, Motherwell denied Celtic victory at Fir Park with a performance of guts and determination.

They refused to accept defeat and showed a resilience that earned them a similar result against Rangers and an emphatic win over Aberdeen. Robinson has bemoaned his side's inconsistency but they always turn up when the big teams come to Fir Park.

It looked like Celtic were on course to return to the top of the league and they played some good football in the first period, but after Griffiths missed the penalty they seldom tested Mark Gillespie.

Rodgers cut a frustrated figure at times on the touchline as his team failed to maintain the fluency they had in the early period and ultimately paid the price with Johnson's late equaliser.