Matt O’Riley insists he and his Celtic teammates will do all that they can to ensure they don’t receive another grilling from Brendan Rodgers.
The Celtic manager was left with no option other than to berate his players during the half-time interval at St Johnstone on Sunday. The Irishman explained that it is the angriest he’s ever felt in football. He was unhappy with his team’s intensity levels, insisting that several of the players were simply going through the motions.
It’s not something Rodgers was prepared to stand for, and so he brought out the hairdryer treatment. It worked, with Celtic’s players reacting to win the match 3-1. O’Riley is keen to avoid seeing that level of anger from the head coach again.
“Yeah,” he said when asked if he was expecting Rodgers to be quite so frustrated. “I think we were slightly angry ourselves because we knew we weren’t doing enough.
“There was a lack of intensity, which should be a given when you play for Celtic. It wasn’t really there and it shows that regardless of whether you are playing Rangers or St Johnstone, no game is easy.
“There is naturally a lot of quality in our team, but if it’s not matched with good intensity and mentality then we deserve to get shouted at.
“Have I seen it before from the manager? Not to that extent. But I don’t think our intensity has been that low before, so it was warranted.
“That was his message after the game – ‘I hope I don’t have to get to that level of anger at half-time again’.
“I think the reaction showed the level we can play at and should be at regularly. Hopefully, it’s a wake-up call going forward.
“I think we are in a good place. He’s quite a calm guy in general. He doesn’t like to get angry unless he has to.
“He’s been around long enough to know when to go a bit harder or when to soften up. It was the right call.”
