Anthony Ralston has never been a Celtic fan favourite, but these days he has plenty of Hoops supporters acknowledging what he brings.
When Celtic went into pre-season with Ralston as our only right-back, it was a major concern. He struggled to impress in the warm-up matches and didn’t overly spark against Midtjylland in UCL qualifying either.
Today, he was part of a Celtic side that mauled Dundee 6-0 at Parkhead. That followed a decent 4-2 win in Jablonec as the Hoops’ form looks like picking up.
Ralston now has two goals in two games, and they were superb ones too. Despite being a right-back, he showed brilliant athleticism and striker’s play to hammer low on the turn against the Dens Park club this afternoon. It comes a week after some brilliant footwork caught him a sight of Craig Gordon’s goal at Tynecastle. He buried with aplomb there too.
But it’s not just his goalscoring form that has fans impressed. It’s his efficiency in combining with Liel Abada. The pair appear to have struck a decent partnership on the right-flank, and one that Celtic have been profiting from in recent games.
Anthony Ralston is showing he could be given a squad role at Celtic
According to stat experts WhoScored, Ralston bagged an 8.8/10 performance rating today. To put that into perspective, that’s the third-highest in the squad ahead of Ryan Christie and Kyogo Furuhashi respectively.
He also managed the joint-highest successful tackles in the squad today – three – alongside captain Callum McGregor. A solid passing percentage to his name too, Ralston proved to be a tidy performer.
Getting used to Postecoglou’s inverted full-back system was never going to be easy. However, despite having limited ability, Ralston has played a key role in Celtic’s impressive performances over the last week.
None of this means we don’t need a new right-back by the way. Anthony still isn’t the long-term answer. However, he’s proving he can have a squad role to play under the new boss. His form certainly isn’t poor enough to suggest he drops out of the senior squad anytime soon.
And today, the Celtic supporters were keen to acknowledge his upturn in form. Something that’s certainly taken plenty of us back:
In other news, Ange Postecoglou appears to have already solved one of Neil Lennon’s frustrating Celtic issues
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