Ally McCoist was left stunned by Celtic star Daizen Maeda’s work rate in the Scottish League Cup final yesterday and Ange Postecoglou agreed.
The Bhoys lifted their first trophy of the campaign with a 2-1 win over their Glasgow rival Rangers at Hampden Park.
Kyogo Furuhashi’s brace ensured Rangers were unable to mount a comeback and the Japanese forward deservedly grabbed the headlines.
But as usual, Maeda put in a brilliant shift on the left-hand side of the Celtic attack, particularly off the ball, and McCoist highlighted his performance after the game.
McCoist stunned by Maeda’s work rate
McCoist joined Postecoglou, alongside Gordon Strachan and Chris Sutton, after Celtic lifted the Viaplay Cup at Hampden.
The former Rangers man remarked that he suffers with ‘cramp’ just from watching Maeda run up and down the left-hand side.
“Ange, I was going to ask you – speaking to you before, you’ve definitely got a good balance about your team, a nice shape about your team. But I want to talk about your front three, totally different right? Jota, who I thought was a little bit quieter today, Kyogo does his job perfectly,” McCoist told Viaplay.
“But that fella on the left-hand side, Maeda, I don’t know what you’re feeding him. I get cramp watching him mate, it’s incredible. But it would be a shame just to say his work rate, there’s a lot more to it than that.”
And Postecoglou delivered a brilliant response on the 25-year-old after McCoist’s comments.
“Yeah, there is. He was up against a very good player in [James] Tavernier today and there was a couple of times where he tried to go past him. But the thing about him is he just keeps going, he doesn’t stop and he does give us good balance,” the Celtic boss said.
“It’s funny because our attacking players are so important to our defensive set-up and him and Kyogo are key components of that, they put the opposition under pressure. We know that guys like [Connor] Goldson are good coming out from the back so we wanted to restrict that.
“As you said, he’s always a threat going the other way and I had him at Yokohama and I was delighted to bring him across here. I knew that with his mindset and his attitude that whatever gaps there were in his game, he’s going to work awfully hard to try and fix them.”
Maeda has improved significantly in terms of his attacking output over the past couple of months and he continues to be a key player in this Celtic side.
He dealt with any threat from James Tavernier exceptionally well yesterday and even provided some of an assist on the day, as Greg Taylor’s cross ran through him on the way to striking teammate Kyogo.
Kyogo stole the show with his brace, but players like Maeda are vital to Postecoglou’s side and he really sets the tone with his relentless pressing off the ball.
You get the feeling that there is plenty more to come from him too, considering his improvement in the final third in recent months.
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