Ange Postecoglou always said it was ludicrous that title predictions were being dished out at this time a year ago.
And the boss is adamant his side’s current seven-point lead won’t change a solitary thing within Celtic ’s fiercely-focused mindset having lived through last term’s turnaround. Postecoglou ’s men head to Motherwell on Wednesday night with a reasonable cushion at the summit of the table following 12 wins in their opening 13 Premiership matches.
It’s a contrasting position from 12 months ago when the Greek-Aussie was still relatively new in the job and his rapidly-assembled squad were battling to keep tabs at the top. At one stage, Celtic were being written off as title contenders, yet they surged ahead of Rangers by the conclusion to lift the trophy.
It’s why, with only just over a third of the Premiership programme completed this season, he has made it crystal clear his team will keep their feet firmly on the pedal and dismisses any notion of a mentality change due to the role-reversal. Postecoglou said: “No because if the mentality changed it would have changed last year as well.
“I was pretty consistent last year in saying that looking at a table and trying to predict the outcome at this stage is just ludicrous. Yeah we're seven points ahead, but we were four points behind a year ago and won the league by four points.
“So nothing changes. It’s not because I’m dismissive of it. Obviously we are in a strong position, but we need to push on.
“Because, even though there’s been a lot of games, the reality of it is we are only a third of the way through the season. The majority of it is still to come. We’ve got to make sure we keep going. We’ve had a really strong start, but the key to us is improving through the season and making an even stronger finish and the rest will take care of itself.”
Celtic go to Fir Park in superb domestic form. Victory at the venue in the Premier Sports Cup three weeks ago sits within a run of seven-successive domestic wins. Whilst also having had to juggle Champions League commitments through the current schedule, the manager has had to be adept in team selection.
After making four changes to his starting line-up for the opening game of the current spell since the last international break, he’s made a further 46 to this point. Postecoglou has been mindful throughout about keeping a freshness and a vibrancy within the group and his studied approach has paid dividends.
More alterations are likely to be made for tonight’s game in Lanarkshire from last weekend’s win over Dundee United and again for Saturday’s home clash with Ross County. Ultimately, Postecoglou admits it’s probably more switches and tweaks than he would prefer, but the situation has demanded such action.
He said: “Under any sort of normal circumstances, even in those circumstances, it’s probably too many. I was really conscious of us getting through this period with as many fit bodies as possible so we had the energy to make sure it didn’t affect our performances.
“I think every time I’ve made six or seven changes, even though I’m putting in fantastic players, it affects the cohesion of the team. Credit to the lads, we’ve found our way through that. The alternative for us was to rely on a core group of players.
“We went through this last year and I remember going into games with barely enough players to fill a bench and we were calling up kids from our B team for numbers and to play in the first team. For me, it was a balance between how can I ensure we are strong through this and don’t lose too many players through injury without it affecting the cohesion of the team?
“Did I get it right? For the most part, yes. But I’ve got no doubt that if the games were more spaced out and I made less changes, I think our form would have been even stronger.”
Only Matt O’Riley and Reo Hatate have started every one of the 11 fixtures during this sequence and both are strong contenders to be in the starting side again tonight. The Danish Under-21 star and the Japanese have both performed superbly during the rigorous period and Postecoglou says it’s huge for their development.
Injured captain Callum McGregor is the poster-boy for being relentless in terms of appearances. Ironically, it is the captain’s absence with a knee issue which has led to O’Riley filling the role, but the manager sees great benefit.
He explained: “It’s been important. Again it’s a position where provided the lads themselves embrace it, you can grind through in those midfield areas. In these periods of football you are more concerned about the guys who are doing more of the high speed running stuff, your full-backs, wingers and strikers.
“They are the ones who you more need to manage through. But credit to Matt and Reo. You still need to be mentally resilient and strong. You’ve seen that with Callum. He’s fantastic at just keeping on going in that midfield position game after game.
“It was only an impact injury that’s kept him out. For us, with Matt and Reo this year, we want to build that resilience in them. I think they’ll come out if it better footballers and stronger mentally. Just the fact they’ve got through it and have played so well through this whole time.”
READ NEXT
