Kris Boyd hailed Mikey Johnston and Hyeongyu Oh for the impact they had from the bench during Celtic’s 3-1 win at St Johnstone.
After the hour mark, Celtic and Brendan Rodgers were fearing the worst and a possible defeat after getting knocked out of Europe days earlier.
But there is a reason why Celtic are the champions of Scotland, as the team, led by captain Callum McGregor, charged the team to all three points.
Mikey Johnston came on as a half-time substitute and Kris Boyd thinks he ‘changed the game’, as he told Sky Sports Football (03/12/23 at 2:10 pm).
But it wasn’t just the Republic of Ireland international who got the plaudits, with Kris Boyd praising Hyeongyu Oh as well for putting himself about – Chris Sutton was also left impressed.
That was a prime example of Celtic’s squad pushing the team to three points and maintaining the eight-point lead at the top of the table.
Mikey Johnston and Hyeongyu Oh’s impact for Celtic
“Mikey Johnston, when you come on with the pace he has got,” said Boyd. “Willing to run, not only down the line, but he will come inside and mix his game up.
“Defenders start to question themselves and drop even further. The spaces started to open up for Celtic.
“It was different for St Johnstone to deal with and I thought they struggled. Oh when he came on, he used his body really well and his movement is very good.
“Mikey Johnston definitely changed the game. But Oh had a big impact as well. His link-up play.”
Will Hyeongyu Oh and Mikey Johnston start for Celtic against Hibs?
The games are coming thick and fast now, especially with this busy festive period.
But Rodgers has to rotate the squad for the sake of resting his players, but the likes of Johnston and now possibly Oh deserve a start.
Kyogo Furuhashi isn’t firing as well as he would like, so possibly bringing in Oh on Wednesday night might be the way to go.
Either way, Johnston definitely deserves his shot because he was also impressive off the bench against Lazio in the Champions League.
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