Barry Ferguson accused Ange Postecoglou of not having a Plan B.
But when Plan A is this good, the Celtic boss doesn’t need to change it for anyone. In the build-up to Saturday's Old Firm clash at Parkhead, former Ibrox captain Ferguson claimed in Record Sport that Gio van Bronckhorst had the Aussie coach sussed.
But by full-time, the only ones left clueless were the Rangers manager and his players. They couldn’t live with the way Postecoglou had set his team up to play. Celtic were quicker and sharper in every department as they romped to a comprehensive 4-0 Premiership win. And on another day, they could have won by more. Since the day he arrived from Japan, Postecoglou has said he’ll stick to his principles.That’s what earned Celtic their title back last season.
And after bludgeoning their city rivals into submission again at Parkhead with their free-flowing attacking style - why wouldn’t he?
Afterwards, he didn’t mention Ferguson by name. But the ex-Rangers man’s comments were clearly used as extra motivation for the Hoops.
Postecoglou said: “Maybe if I was German, Dutch or Spanish, people might look at me differently as a manager in terms of tactics. Apparently I’ve got one simple approach, a plan A. But we’ll just stick to that.
“I’m really proud of this group again. We know the occasion, it was a big game for our club and supporters. Rangers are a very good team so we knew going into it, it would be a challenge.
“But the boys were outstanding from start to finish. The quality of our football was good and we just worked our socks off.
“We want to be a team that’s relentless and 60,000 fans come here to watch good football. We’ve started the season really strongly but we’ve got stronger each week and today was another strong performance.
“People have been dismissive because they thought the opposition we’ve had so far weren’t up to it. We were brilliant last week but people spoke about how poor Dundee United were. That suits us because it ignores our part in it. It will probably be the same after today.”
One player who typifies Postecolou’s plan is Liel Abada, who bagged a brace against Rangers. At just 20, the Israeli winger is only going to get better but he’s proved to be deadly in derby games.
Not for the first time, he gave Croatian left-back Borna Barisic a torrid time. For a wide player, his hunger and desire to get into the box and score is unrivalled in the Scottish game.
Postecoglou said: “Abada was great but he’s been great since we signed him. He’s just got a real maturity in front of goal. He’s got this knack of, not just being in the right place, but being calm and putting the ball in the net.
“That’s a hell of a commodity to have. He was outstanding but I know Liel, he’ll come in on Sunday for feedback and try to improve his game.
“Also, our defensive work was brilliant today. We got the fourth goal from our press and didn’t give Rangers much time on the ball at all.
“Every time they got through a line of ours, someone stepped in to make it hard for them. When they breached our box, we were strong. Joe Hart didn’t have too many saves to make.
“Overall, our defensive work put our dominance on the game. Our football took over from there. We were a bit more direct than we normally are which caused them problems too. But that will be tested on Tuesday night against Real Madrid.”
Incredibly, it’s the Spanish giants and Champions League holders up next for Celtic at Parkhead. They upped their tempo for the derby and Rangers weren’t ready for it.
Now, Postecoglou says they’ll try and do it again by going up another level against Carlo Ancelotti’s superstars.
He said: “We were ready for this game but it was a step up in intensity levels. Rangers are a good team, no-one has said they aren’t. They’re in the Champions League and beat good teams to get there.
“But we were ready for them. And there’s no reason why we can’t play with that intensity on Tuesday and trouble Real.
“We don’t need motivation to raise our game. If you go to Ross County and score four, you need to be motivated or you slip up. To score nine goals last week against Dundee United and break a record, you need to be motivated. We were motivated today and we’ll be motivated again against Madrid."
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