Honest Arne Engels has revealed angry Celtic stars were fuming with the first-half flop at Hibs.
And the honest Belgian is clear his team will never hunt excuses after suffering their rare title slip. As the champions headed out of Easter Road defeated, Brendan Rodgers’ troops had justifiable reasons to claim mitigating circumstances. Naturally, the controversial chalking-off of a late Daizen Maeda strike dominated post-match discussions. Had the Japanese’s attacker smart finish been allowed to stand, it is impossible to deny that Celtic could have even gone on and won.
Of course, the fact Rodgers’ men were still chasing the game at that advanced stage was down to the poor opening-period performance. By the high standards they have set, the champions were miles off it during that wayward first half, yet, once again, an excuse was right there at their disposal if they wanted it in the shape of Munich.
To most outside of the Celtic dressing room, Rodgers’ team could have passed off their sluggish Edinburgh start given the savage exertions of their Champions League clash against Bayern in Bavaria beforehand. The energy-sapping 90-minutes in the game’s highest-octane tournament and the crushing pain of their late exit, never mind the travel.
But Engels wasn’t having it. There was no attempt to absolve responsibility for the opening period as he outlined the mood amongst the group as they reassembled at the interval staring down a 2-0 deficit.
He said: “Of course everybody was angry at the team performance. But nobody was screaming or something because we knew we had a second-half to go and try to get the equaliser and the winning goal. You saw us pushing, pushing to the limit. We are disappointed, especially with the first half. I think this can never happen to us.”
When it was put to Engels that he and his colleagues could be afforded a pass for an off-day or even a weak half, he instantly responded: “No, never. We don’t have excuses. If we lose or win, we don’t have excuses. I think we are like real sports people and we always that mentality of trying to do everything really good. That’s a really positive thing of our group.
“You see it also in the second half that we don’t put our heads down or something. We just keep on pushing to try to get that equaliser and we almost got it. We just need to take the positive points of the second half with us.
“That [second-half] is our normal level, I think. The first half can never happen to us, but we also need to take the positive. I think we did great in the second half. You see that we were pressing to get a goal. We got so much energy into the second half that we had chances also. So we need to just go on.”
Celtic did show character and resilience after the interval, but, in the words of captain Callum McGregor, it was a “poor result” and a “bad day at the office.”
The strength for Rodgers through the gruelling mid-part of the season has been his ability to make switches and changes, to rotate and alternate selections to maintain freshness and form. Last season, he could barely make an outfield starting switch for a game at Easter Road following a hectic 2-2 draw with Atletico Madrid and his flat team drew 0-0.
With better options and more quality choices assembled this term, he’s been able to make those changes to good effect through the late autumn and winter.
But, back in Leith, the system suffered a rare failure. The manager changed three from the Munich side with Greg Taylor, Luke McCowan and Adam Idah restored the starting line-up. Not one the trio reappeared for the second period. Taylor looked uncomfortable having not been able to get back as Josh Campbell bagged the opener.
McCowan, despite one delightful pass to get Johnston away for a strike, was not his vibrant self and Idah toiled. The Irishman had one misfire when he slashed at a cross and another when he didn’t get his head up to see Nicolas Kuhn free for a glaring one-on-one chance. Such errors were punished severely when Campbell headed his second.
Rodgers instantly re-installed the three boys left out, Jota, Reo Hatate and Jeffrey Schlupp, for the restart and the Portuguese, in particular, had an impact.
He set up Hatate for the miscue which led to Maeda’s legitimate goal and then embarked on a surging 60-yard run which ended with a shot being kicked off the line by Rocky Bushiri. Again, he could have picked out Kuhn before shooting, but it was just one of the days when the right pass was either not picked or not executed, or it was rushed by Celtic.
The one thing Celtic did do was keep at it. They are relentless. Even when not at their best, they kept pushing and probing and hunting with every drop until MacLean called time. Engels said: “You see that we have so much energy and we push every team to the limits. Nobody from us on the ground and some of them were.
“You see that we got the chances and we keep on running and doing our stuff, what we always do. That’s also what makes us really strong, I think. It’s up to us to do this every game and keep on going until the end of the season.”