Ange Postecoglou has spent the past 15 months building it up. Now, with a settled squad and the challenge more Real-istic, it is time for more detailed judgements in Europe. Postecoglou and his team were, quite correctly, placed under no pressure to deliver when going into continental competition last season.
There isn’t a manager in the world who could have inherited the shambles he did that summer and got such an unfurnished squad through the Champions League qualifiers. The failure at the first hurdle to Danish side FC Midtjylland was no fault of the Aussie.
Postecoglou managed to steer his team beyond FK Jablonec and AZ Alkmaar to gain entry to the group stages of the Europa League and there were encouraging signs throughout the campaign with a team that wasn’t properly built or gelled. Celtic didn’t get through their section, but three wins from six group games was not a bad return. It offered signs of progress and landed them a post-Christmas spot in the Conference.
It’s personal choice how the 5-1 aggregate defeat to Norwegians Bodo/Glimt at the start of this year is viewed. It is fair to suggest that the Scottish Premiership title race and the opportunity to gain automatic entry to these group stages in the Champions League was the main motivation for Celtic at the time of that double header.
That was fairly evident when the teamsheets for the second leg in freezing Bodo were handed out with a host of regulars left out. But any doubters will, perhaps with some justification, point to the fact that choice only came following a disappointing 3-1 defeat for the first-pick line-up in the opening leg.
Domestic bliss made that exit irrelevant by May with this assault on the premier competition becoming the fixation. Yet even going into it, there was something of a feeling of a free-hit for Postecoglou’s team on night one. Of course, they didn’t think that way. Of course they went in there believing that they could do something against Real Madrid and it is to their great credit that they made such a contest of it for a spell against the champions of Europe.
Celtic’s performance for over half the game seven days ago against the Spanish superstars meant that, although the home tie was lost 3-0 in the end, there was little other than platitudes handed out afterwards to Postecoglou and his team. Again, that’s fair enough. No club has won this competition more than Real. They have nailed it five of the last nine years and they are experts at doing what they did in Glasgow’s East End. Staying in games while the opposition are having a right go at them and then finding a way to stylishly pick them off and win when all is said and done.
Outside of Celtic Park, defeat to Real was deemed almost inevitable, but that’s not the case in Warsaw. Now, rightly or wrongly, there feels a certain degree of expectation around the travelling group. Sure Celtic are still learning on the job and it is going to be a while before this current group gains the proper experience of operating in the elite competition.
But this is not Real and this is a more accurate situation on which to judge the progress of Postecoglou’s team. Shakhtar Donetsk are no-one’s mugs. They are playing for their country, they have an excellent group of young players who have been offered more opportunity through FIFA rules which permitted many of the club’s foreign stars to leave under-siege Ukraine and find new homes.
If anyone was in any doubt about their ability to perform, while Celtic were scrapping it out against Real, Shakhtar were taking RB Leipzig apart at the same time on their own patch. The 4-1 scoreline was a result which reverberated around the continent.
Yet Shakhtar are on the road again. The Russian invasion means they have to play their so-called home matches in Poland. Essentially, it’s a neutral venue. Postecoglou wants to make steps with Celtic. He wants them to compete at this level on a regular basis. The supporters should get a clearer view of where, in European terms, the team is placed at this stage of their development under Postecoglou.
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