Ange Postecoglou has admitted that the Celtic number one spot is up for grabs ahead of tonight’s clash in Midtjylland.
Vasilis Barkas has been Postecoglou’s clear preferred choice in pre-season. However, some costly errors in recent games against Midtjylland and West Ham United have seen many lose confidence in him.
The problem is that our back-up just isn’t good enough either. Scott Bain has proven himself to be not of the standard Celtic need in their number one over the last several years.
However, there’s still a chance he could be thrown in against the Danes this evening.
As quoted by the Scotsman, Postecoglou said: “Apart from the first leg, consistently through pre-season Bainy and Barky have shared the duties. I don’t think anyone is number one. They are competing for spots. I’ll see how everyone trains and select a team from there.
“In terms of Bainy, he’s been very good in training and games. I made a call to play Barky in the first game and I’ll make a call on the second game after training.”
Celtic boss will need to bring a new number one in soon
Like it or not, goalkeeper is still a priority position this summer. Links to Mat Ryan over the last couple of months before his move to Real Sociedad suggests it’s still an area we’re looking at [Sky Sports].
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The fact is we can’t rely on Barkas or Bain just now. Ideally, one would be sold whilst the other would take the number two role. It’s not as if Conor Hazard is suddenly going to become first-choice either.
If we win tonight, chances are it will be in spite of who is in goals. We’ve yet to win a game where we’ve come out thinking “thank God we have Barkas/Bain”. Think of how often we did that with Fraser Forster, for example.
This season is far too important to be messing around with the goalkeeping position. Celtic need a number one, and he needs to be a standout performer too.
The market shuts on August 31st, but Celtic can’t go leaving it that late. We have a Scottish Premiership opener against Hearts on Saturday and from then on, it’s all go.
Hopefully the board spring into action and help the manager out here. It shouldn’t be that Postecoglou has to work with two goalkeepers he never signed.